#so that's what anhe is sort of based on

[fell-court]

As mentioned in my last post: the other four characters that I came up with today for flowering verse!

Given that Shadowbringers takes place in another world, the previous four wouldn't be able to accompany Clio, Brynblyss, Tsutsuji and Lorenza to the First. Therefore, I came up with four new characters to make up a full party for that expansion's trials, normal raids, and alliance raids! I have less actual lore for most of them, but I'm always happy to take questions if anyone has any~

The red-haired Mystel with the prosthetic right arm is Sasha-Bea, a strong and beautiful swordfighter whose fighting style would be comparable to the samurai of the Source. I've been envisioning her as a runaway noble of sorts, fleeing Eulmore in favour of the Crystarium and taking whatever wealth she could with her.

The strangely-still Viis is known only as Anhedonia (or Anhe for short), a taciturn fighter whose skill with a scythe is as uncanny as their affinity with sin eaters. Born around a hundred years ago somewhere to the east of Norvrandt, they and their mother were both irrevocably corrupted by Light before their birth - yet they seem to have been able to stave off turning somehow, and can even draw sin eaters to their side in combat. (So, like a reaper of the Source, but associated with sin eaters instead of voidsent.)

The silver-robed Ronso is Ilya, originally born in Slitherbough but who has since left the Rak'tika Greatwood in the hopes of finding a way to restoring sight of the night sky his astrologian techniques still try to connect with. He harbours some guilt for feeling like he has turned his back on his fellow Night's Blessed.

The shield-bearing Drahn man is currently named Vonric, an aspiring knight descended from the people of what was once the Kingdom of Voeburt. He is chronically unlucky, but the constant mishaps he runs into have forced him to learn a wide variety of crafting and gathering skills, which he almost favours more than his combat prowess.

That's all that I have for these four at the moment! However, I'm very happy to take questions on any of them if anyone wants to ask something, as it's a really good way of developing them!!

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 6/25/2024

i played a game that is not genshin impact!

listening

paige kennedy's lingerie model. the line "cause i'm a little rat boy in the body of a lingerie model" startled a laugh out of me. off the discover weekly playlist.

-

reading

thank you philip.

Johnny Guitar by Roy Chanslor, on interlibrary loan bc i was hoping reading the book would kickstart my long-planned fic based on the movie. surprise! wildly different book i read in one sitting! the locations, most of the characters (except most of them are much younger) and who's on what sides are essentially the same, but everything else is different!

there are five whole women in this thing, which is a staggering number for a western. i don't know that i have a clear idea of what this book is trying to say about Women in general or specific. i've just been kind of rolling it around in my head for a while. once i figure out what i want to say about this book everyone better watch out

-

watching

borrowed my best friend's husband and their disney plus account to watch a lot of star wars. we certainly had a lot of thoughts about the show Ahsoka but none of them were particularly complimentary. it's dave filoni playing the fucking hits. would you like some wolves and some owls and people having bad feelings and recreating the training session on the millennium falcon from ANH? would you like some fairly lackluster lightsaber battles? would you like the least interesting concept of a waiting room/purgatory/underworld you've ever seen? this is a show where we meet Anakin again and TRAVEL TO A DIFFERENT FUCKING GALAXY, the BIRTHPLACE of some WITCHES. can we be a little bit excited about new things please??? please?????? we are so very bogged down in cutting back and forth, bc god forbid everyone be in the same place at the same time, that we get only the tiniest glimpses of fun new places. show me the places. stop giving me medium shots of people yapping. easily three quarters of this show is filmed from the waist up or closer. what fucking gives. if i really really wanted to scratch the itch of a worrisome legacy and lost love and slightly weird student/teacher dynamics i would go read a contemporary literary novel. show me the interesting parts of star wars and not just the fanservicey callback parts please thanks

we did have a lot of fun with The Acolyte, which genuinely does feel like a breath of fresh air. most of the dialogue is extremely bad, which is sort of par for the course for a star war, but the gleeful jumping with both feet into some real melodramatic weekly serial/space opera tropes!!! much more interested in playing with a heightened narrative/playing with narrative at all, unlike ahsoka which is more focused on filling in a little blank spot!!! witches here also!!! the GOOD TWIN and the EVIL TWIN, several inventive assassinations, the CLEARING of one's NAME, a cursed planet, some fights that feel like they're playing with samurai movies and westerns in a fun new way instead of reminding me of a better thing i could be watching. thank you im eating this with a spoon. many people are very mad about it bc the protagonist is black and perhaps not perfectly straight. the public says this star wars is bad, bc of woke and bc of cliffhangers. i think this one is fun actually so far!!!

-

playing

Freshly Frosted (2022, Quantum Astrophysics Guild). free on Epic rn and quite honestly this should be a self-care/old people brain plasticity phone game. why it is NOT on mobile is beyond me. why it is on SWITCH is also beyond me.

it did make me miss a novelty doughnut and coffee mini local chain in the five college area that has long since gone under. one of my therapists used to have an office above one of their stores and i used to go to a class at smith on wednesdays, go to therapy, and then jog for the half hour bus back to umass, reward doughnut in hand.

it opens with a soft-voiced woman telling you about how she likes to decompress by laying in a field and imagining a donut factory in the sky. she gives encouraging little tips and "hey! be nice to yourself!" throughout the game, but mostly at the beginnings of levels and introducing new mechanics. there are, perhaps, overly plentiful achievements.

there are a dozen dozen levels and i played through the first three dozen, or the first three boxes (normie don't draw over your line, multi track drifting, merging paths). i once had a level correct and then hit undo out of indecision and the tutorial lady told me "“You had it, click the undo button in the top right to undo”. which i don't believe i've ever seen in a game.

i stopped at the third box bc there’s a universal order to ingredients (always frosting then sprinkles then whipped cream then etc) but it does not ever tutorialize that it will only put the next ingredient on if the previous ones are fulfilled. like this was the level i figured this out on.

on further levels in this box i was not thinking super hard about what the actual order was and i couldn't really tell you how i solved a particular level except for making sure every possible path existed. maybe this gets super wild in later levels idk but three dozen levels was enough of a novelty for me. if i may be a little mean to a perfectly fine game, it feels like a coding bootcamp project in the way it steps through its logic and introduces new mechanics.

-

making

cross stitch update. i don't believe this will be done by my brother's birthday

[antianakin]

The obi wan Kenobi show doesn’t work because it contradicts episode 4, which specifically states that the last time obi wan and vader met was in episode 3, having them duel again is just pointless and it contradicts an entire film, also why doesn’t Palpatine and the Empire arrest Bail Organa if they have suspicions he’s working with a Jedi? Bail Organa is smart and hes a good guy against the fascist empire and evil sith but in this show it makes him look not very smart.

I'm not sure why you're sending this message to ME, someone who's made it fairly clear that I LIKE the Kenobi show (and if I haven't, this is my definitive statement that I LOVE the Kenobi show and find it one of the best shows that D+ has released thus far), unless you're intentionally trying to start a debate/discussion about this.

I'm not going to change my mind about the Kenobi show and suddenly decide it's a bad show, so if you're trying to change my mind about it for some reason, it won't work. Much like the Prequel Trilogy, I'm perfectly willing to acknowledge the Kenobi show has flaws and isn't a perfectly written show, but it has a VISION and a PLAN, something that is all too rare within Star Wars these days.

It's also one of the VERY vanishingly few genuinely pro-Jedi and sort-of Jedi-centric stories out there. I'm unlikely to get very many of those, so Kenobi is a diamond in a rough for me. So I don't CARE what accusations people level at this show. Most of them are inaccurate or entirely based on personal taste alone. If the Kenobi show isn't for you, it isn't for you; there's PLENTY of Star Wars things that have come out that aren't for me but seem to have something in them that appeals to other people. Nothing anyone critiques about it is going to change the fact that there's a LOT I love about this show and the fact that it feels like it was made with fans like me in mind.

So if what you want is to just vent about a show that didn't work for you, maybe go to someone else to do it because you won't get it from me. (If you want to vent about, say, TBB or the Ahsoka show on the other hand, I'm exactly who you should talk to. Come vent at me about those shows any time.)

All that being said, this is my response to your specific accusations.

First, I'll address the Bail Organa thing because that just seems simpler. The ONLY person who has any suspicions that Bail is working with a Jedi during the Kenobi show is Reva, who leaves the whole Inquisitorius and the Empire by the end of the show. While there's perhaps some evidence of Obi-Wan wandering around with Leia, he's demonstrably not the person who TOOK Leia nor is he the person who RETURNED Leia, so there's zero evidence of Obi-Wan and Bail actually interacting beyond the message Bail sent to Obi-Wan that nobody saw except Reva and Obi-Wan, and that Reva took with her off of Jabiim, so it's never going to end up as evidence of anything.

The other reason Palpatine is not going after Bail Organa despite what are likely STRONG suspicions that Bail isn't loyal and is helping the Rebellion, is the same reason that the Senate doesn't get eliminated until ANH. Palpatine is still putting up a semblance of "democracy" to string people along with the idea that the Empire is a benevolent force working on behalf of the greater good. Bail is a well-known and well-liked and influential Senator on his own, AND he's the husband of the reigning monarch of Alderaan. Killing him without pretty serious evidence of wrong-doing could be a majorly bad political move for Palpatine. He also likely believes that, even if Bail IS working with the Rebellion, he's not that big of a threat. Why expend effort on killing someone who's not that big of a threat and when it might cause more people to turn against you for killing a well-liked dude without evidence of wrong-doing? What does Palpatine truly GAIN from this? He ONLY turns on Alderaan after two things happen: first, the Death Star is completed and he has a weapon that he can use to eliminate large swathes of enemies VERY quickly; second, Leia is caught working with the Rebels which implicates the entire royal family. So now not only does Palpatine have evidence of wrong-doing, he also has the means to stop CARING about what people think anyway because the Death Star means he can completely dismantle the ENTIRE SENATE and do whatever he wants to whoever he wants.

Now let's look at the accusation that the Kenobi show contradicts what's stated in ANH. Personally, I don't think it does. I'll grant that it contradicts what's IMPLIED by both ANH and ROTS and what most fans largely had assumed had happened. I'll even grant that the extra meeting during this time period is a little awkward narratively given that Obi-Wan had to win in order to survive at all but he also couldn't kill Anakin and people already had issues with this in ROTS where it's more easily explained away, so it's even harder to buy that Obi-Wan doesn't finish the job in THIS story.

But none of that means that it directly contradicts anything said in ANH. When Anakin first senses Obi-Wan's presence, all he says is he's feeling a presence he hasn't felt since... and then he fades off and never finishes that sentence. What he says during their actual fight is "I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again, at last. The circle is now complete... When I left you, I was but the learner; now I am the master." There's NOTHING specific in this dialogue. The bit about having been a learner when Anakin left is already contradicted by the Prequels anyway since Anakin was technically already Knighted by the time he betrays everyone and joins the Sith and the bit about having "left" Obi-Wan is again contradicted by the Prequels first since their final confrontation has Obi-Wan leave Anakin, not the other way around (unless we count the initial betrayal and joining the Sith as Anakin "leaving" but they see each other after that, so). So anything you could claim the Kenobi show "contradicted" from ANH is something the Prequels already contradicted. Anakin also makes the claim here that he's a "Master" when Anakin is actually a Sith APPRENTICE and he wasn't ever a Jedi Master, either. Anakin is someone who exaggerates and manipulates the truth of things as he wants, so everything he says has to be taken with a grain of salt anyway. He's an unreliable narrator in the extreme.

Which makes it pretty easy to just say, "Well Anakin's lying about shit because this is what he wants to believe even if it isn't true." Sure, it doesn't match with the Kenobi show, but it doesn't match the Prequels either, so unless you're about to tell me that we have to toss out the entire Prequel Trilogy (something we're ALSO not going to agree on), then I think the Kenobi show should be given a pass for this.

Finally, like I said, I DO recognize there's some awkwardness introduced to the narrative in this show. There's weird timing for things, it does go against popular assumptions, etc. But just like a lot of people have done for shows THEY wanted to enjoy, I'm willing to come up with my own headcanons to make the Kenobi show work. I tend to view the Kenobi show as more of a character exploration via metaphor than a straightforward narrative. This show and the story it's telling are SO laser-focused on Obi-Wan's journey towards reclaiming his Jedi identity that it occasionally has to do some odd things to make the narrative fall into place to allow that journey to happen in exactly the way they want it. The plot came second to the character in this case (the opposite of the Ahsoka show where the plot is very basic and straightforward but the characters were completely left by the wayside which leaves the narrative an incomprehensible mess anyway; give me more shows with flaws like the Kenobi show over shows like the Ahsoka show ANY DAY). Whenever I recommend this show to people I tell them to focus on the character journey Obi-Wan goes on and to view the show more metaphorically than literally. It works for some people, it doesn't for others.

My personal favorite headcanon for the Kenobi show is that it's a representation of Obi-Wan's personal Force Ghost test, not unlike the one we know Yoda had in TCW season 6. In that, he's sent to several different places, some real and some not, in order to face different things he has to overcome before the Force decides he's ready to learn this skill. Sometimes he's led by a specific person through the test, sometimes he's not. This isn't ENTIRELY dissimilar to what happens to Obi-Wan in the Kenobi show where he keeps bouncing to different places and being guided by different characters towards the one major thing he has to face and overcome. And while Anakin's dialogue after the mask is sliced off doesn't make a TON of sense to me as something Anakin would actually say, it works for me as something that Obi-Wan has thought about HIMSELF. Anakin isn't really Anakin here, he's a manifestation of all of Obi-Wan's pain and fears and doubts. Anakin saying that he's not Obi-Wan's failure is something the real Anakin would NEVER say (except as a way to keep separating himself from the atrocities he's done), but it IS something Obi-Wan would need to come to accept. And who better for that lesson to come from than the face of the person who betrayed him, the person who destroyed his universe.

Much like Yoda's journey took him to both real places and some that seem somewhat less real, Obi-Wan's journey could be a mixture of both real events AND some things that are a little more metaphysical. The final confrontation on that moon could perhaps be one of those metaphysical things. He's drawn to that moon and it does work to draw the Empire away from the refugees, but it's not really Anakin he sees down there or something. Does anything in the show support this? No, of course not. But nothing really makes it impossible for it to be true, either. It makes things work better for me, something I'm willing to do because there's a LOT about this show that really really fucking works for me already, so I'm willing to put in a little extra effort to smooth over the things that don't work as well into something else. If you don't like the show enough to do that work, that's fine. But then I'm not the person to come venting to about it.

[geekforhorror]

someone else who writes for luke, yes!!! can i request a fic where you visit his quarters after the battle of yavin and give him a special reward for blowing up the Death Star ;)

you have no idea how much i smiled when I saw this in my inbox :)

_______

lost in paradise

pairing: anh!luke x fem!reader

warning(s): SMUT (DNI IF YOU'RE UNCOMFORTABLE WITH IT!), dom!reader, sub!luke, luke getting flustered, teasing, oral sex (m!receiving), quickie, orgasm, praise, pet names (pretty boy, baby, etc.)

______

He actually did it.

He had come into the station all nervous, thinking that he couldn't do what was asked of him. The leaders of the operation told him to blow up the Death Star and all that filled his mind were worrisome thoughts. However, his friends would make sure he had no doubts going into the mission, especially you since you were his girlfriend. You had reassured him millions of times when it seemed like he wanted to back out of the mission. You even gave him loads of tiny kisses along with it.

"You've got this baby... I believe in you." you said to him before he left. And you were right because just an hour later, he returned to the base with all of the other pilots with the biggest smile on his face. He had ran towards you before wrapping his arms around you in a tight hug. You feverishly kissed his lips and he savored it as your guys’ lips moved against each others.

“I knew you could do it, baby,” you mumbled against his lips before pulling away, his cheeks becoming rosy.

Before he could respond, the leader of the rebellion started to speak. “Thanks to Skywalker and our other friends, the Death Star is no more!” he yells proudly. Cheering erupts between everyone present and it fills your guys’ ears.

“To celebrate, we will present awards to Han Solo and Young Luke Skywalker in their assistance to help destroy Vader’s plans and battle station,” he announces.

“Oh my god, that’s huge for you babe!” you say to him, shocked.

“I can’t believe it either!” he says.

“I’m so proud of you and just for that, I think you deserve a reward,” you say slyly.

“Well yeah… He just said that…” he says a bit confused.

“I meant the reward I have for you, pretty boy,” you say with a smirk.

“You ha- have a reward for me?” he asks, now being obviously flustered by your words.

“Mhmmm… Follow me,” you say softly. He follows your one demand and is now walking behind you like some sort of lost puppy. He seems surprised when the two of you make your way over to the Millennium Falcon and has no idea why you guys were here of all places.

“Why are we here?” he asks politely.

“You’ll see,” you say before offering him your hand. He takes it with no hesitation before the two of you walk into the ship.

“Ready to find out, baby?” you ask him seductively.

“Yeah,” he says breathily. With that, you sit him down on the chair of the cockpit while still standing up. You hastily unbuckle his utility belt and pull away at his zipper. “You want this?” you ask, making sure he was actually on board with this before you did anything.

“Yes please,” he pathetically whines at which you smile at. Luke was always so eager for you and you loved it. You finally sink down onto your knees before palming him through his boxers at which he gasps at. Not long after, you start to gently pump the shaft of his dick, seeing the precum that was dribbling down the base.

“How’s that?” you ask him.

“So good,” Luke replies, now twitching underneath your hand. Fuck, he was so perfect. He was surprisingly bigger than you thought he was, but it would just make this more fun for the both of you.

“And how about this?” you ask before you take in the tip of his dick in your mouth, sucking away at it. He lets out a high pitched moan at this and you can’t help but feel a bit cocky. You continue to suck away before you hollow your cheeks around him. You feel Luke tug at your hair to support himself despite sitting down. With that, you decide to take more inches of him into your mouth.

“Fuck baby, feels so good,” he pants out. As you continue pleasuring him, you come up with an idea to make him even more of a babbling mess. You take more of his cock into your mouth, trying to hold back gags while sucking harder on his hardened dick. While bobbing up and down, you feel saliva spill down your chin as you wrapped your tongue around him, but you couldn’t care less. All that mattered was giving him his well-deserved reward. You circle your tongue around his sensitive spot, only making him expel more pretty noises from his mouth. Suddenly you were alerted to how close Luke was when he twitched in your mouth.

“I don’t know how much longer-, I-” he stammers.

“Just hold on for a bit longer, wanna make this last…” you hum.

“I can’t-“ he says before his release splashes in your sore mouth. Before you pull your mouth from his aching dick, you make sure to swallow every last drop of his cum.

“Tastes so good baby… Just like always,” you say, wiping your chin clean of any excess fluids.

“Thank you for that,” he says to you shyly as he pulls up his pants and pulls the belt through the loops.

“Any time darling, Any time,” you reply with a cheeky smile. Just ask and you shall receive.”

[bubbles-for-all-of-us]

BUBBLES!!! okay first um are you okay babes???? I'm kinda worried about you so please keep me updated and tell me how you're feeling!

I promised a headcanon today so here I am!! and I'm gonna talk a bit about Ellie (because she's baby <3)

So you're welcome to expand as much as you want but basically, in my mind, Reader/you and Ellie are very close. There is this very nurturing and motherly bond between the two of you even if you're close in age and you're not her mom. Just like Joel, you feel the need to protect her and make sure she's okay but you actually are open about it. Joel adores her but he's quite clumsy with his feelings and their relationship is just based on the both of them 'acting tough' With you, it's different and when you arrive in Jackson, your caring nature becomes even more indispensable than before. You may ask why as you're all safe, you have a house, food, etc...but because you're not surviving anymore you have to find a new rhythm, discover what 'living' means and for a kid like Ellie who only knew the cruel, harsh world within the QZ, it is particularly difficult. She can't form a bond with children her age and she's also deeply traumatized from the different tragedies in her young life. And she relies on you a lot. I'm going to use the word 'clingy' but really, not as a negative remark. It's just that her development is a bit...backwards? Her early childhood until her teenage years were spent in force independence when she needed love and stability the most. So now that she has this 'stability' she finds herself completely lost and she doesn't know what to do, all she can hold on to is you. Of course, you allow her and encourage that behavior because it's important for her to feel safe and to finally have this 'normalcy' you've known from your early years. Anyway, you have a very close relationship with Ellie and it quickly became a habit that she slept with you while you were camping. Nights were often very cold and it was easy to get scared in the middle of the forest so naturally, you started bringing your sleeping bags together. That habit certainly didn't stop once you arrived in Jackson. Every night, you would take some time after dinner, etc...to tuck Ellie in, make sure she knows she can tell you anything she needs to talk about, remind her you and Joel are right down the hall and kiss her goodnight. Ellie will probably never admit it out loud but the attention and the love you give her make her feel all sorts of ways, it's so pure she almost wants to cry when you treat her with a gentleness she's never been accustomed to before. There are some nights though where Ellie feels worse than others. Sometimes she wakes up screaming from a nightmare and you and Joel found yourself rushing to her bedroom, holding her until she calms down. Sometimes, she wakes up randomly in the middle of the night and she just can't sleep. Sometimes she just needs you. Like tonight.

Aaaaand that's it for tonight!! what do we think?

I really really really hope you're already feeling better when you find this or at least that it could bring you some comfort and yeah, take care of yourself my little bubble ily <3

-🪷

Anh let's break it down.

She's seen way too much for a 14 year old. Done things that no kid should do at age like that as well. Of course it had scared her. Being an orphan, loosing people she loves, never having anyone to lean on had left her broken. So the fact that you, someone who had shown her emotions aka love, care, affection and so on. You are her main source of comfort. Cause now after 14 years of trying to survive on her own she actually has someone who cares.

It scares Ellie though. Probably even more than Joel but since she's a child she very naturally leans to the nurturing mother role that you hold. Because everything in her body is telling her that that's safety, that that's where she wouldn't have to be afraid. For that fact alone I think that the whole adaptation period in Jackson where everyone is like pufff there's nothing to be scared of here would be extremely hard for her. Because big walls, lots man with guns might read safe for most but it ain't for Ellie. So she requires your nurturing even more. She gets worried more easily, her brain still searches for bad things, for a way that she could lose this all.

I think you would be sleeping with her for the first week or so. The room feels strange, the hallway to your room is way too long and way too dark. She's not used to staying in a house. The sheets fell weird. Everything is way too comfy. I feel like you would find her on the floor the first couple of nights. And no matter how much you'll try to convince her to sleep in the bed, she just wouldn't do it. So you have little sleepovers on the floor instead.

You and Joel encourage Ellie to speak about the fears in head. Both sharing your own worries and how communicating them to someone you trust is a great way to let it go and to see a different perspective. But there's never any pushing in it. It she just wants to sit in silence that's what you three will do. Joel is big on taking her out to the farm so she could be around animals. Sticks around to watch her pet them and feed them. Challenging her to a pun war once in a while.

[hangmanwh0re]

"Anh bỏ bùa gì mà lại làm em yêu vậy" What Spell Did You Cast to Make Me Fall In Love With You?

pairing – hangman x f!reader, jake seresin x f!reader, wife!reader, pilot!reader

summary – the marriage between the cocky blonde texan who thinks he's too good for everybody and the soft vietnamese girl

warnings – fluff, no smut, safe for minor readers, PG-13 language so be warned, like three mentions of alcohol, VERY slight angst, also no usage of y/n | 1.59k

word count – 1,587

notes – based on my desired reality (DR) vietnamese oc born in the united states, callsign is "dragon" and name is nicole. also, the title is a line in a vietnamese song called see tình by hoàng thùy linh, it's a good song! also, this is the first fic i've ever written in full so please enjoy!

ACT 1, SCENE 1 - THE HARD DECK

Nicole walks back to the pool table from the bar, drinks in hand. She hands a beer to Jake.

"Mrs. Seresin, what on earth are you drinking?" says Jake "Hangman" Seresin, reminding her of her soon-to-be married name. He gestures to her glass, a rosy-colored concoction of various fruit juices and seltzer.

"Have you got a single thought behind those green marble eyes of yours? Asian flush, genius!" she responds, the tone jokingly mocking.

Phoenix and Coyote almost choked on their drinks laughing at the exchange. Phoenix puts a hand on her chest and clears her throat.

"You know, when you guys told us about the engagement thing, I almost didn't believe you. Cowboy marrying a city girl. Now that's funny." said Phoenix.

Jake sashayed over to Nicole, wrapping his big arms around her. His way of showing her love was through physical touch. Hugging, kissing, holding hands.

"You know I'm only teasing you, baby." he said. Nicole giggled and wrapped her hands around his arms. Eye-rolling and further snickers ensue from Natasha and Javy.

Nicole understood this familiar plea for attention. They best enjoyed moments where it was just the two of them. No snickers, no glances, no doubts of their relationship. "Well, guess we better be on our way, it's.." Nicole glanced at her watch. "5:54!" she exclaimed, breaking out of Jake's grip.

Jake and Nicole set down their drinks down on a table. "Take care of our tab!" Jake said hurriedly, as he and Nicole frantically get ready to leave the Hard Deck. Nicole reached into her pocket and grabbed her keys, organized by size. "We'll see you guys at the ceremony," she said, grabbing Jake's hand and speed-walking with him out to the car.

Phoenix looked at Coyote in disbelief and scoffed, "Those two never pay their bill."

"Good thing I brought my credit card.." said Coyote.

ACT 1, SCENE 2 – THE CAR RIDE HOME

Nicole grasped the steering wheel as she breathed deeply. Music was softly playing through the speakers.

As "Glue Song" by beabeedoobee came on, Nicole glanced out of her window at the orange-red sunset, a common sight since moving to San Diego five years ago.

Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, which was 1,082 miles away, she enjoyed and preferred the sweltering heat of Southern California rather than Oregon's aqueous, blinding rains and windswept squalls.

She turned the music volume down using the button on the dashboard.

"Is something wrong?" Jake said, looking over at her. Placing his fingers in her hair, he started to run them through the ends of her slightly wavy, brown hair.

"Jake, you know my family."

"Well, of course I do, we've had dinner with them at your parents' restaurant so many times."

"That's sort of the problem." Nicole sighed, shifting a little bit in the leather driver's seat.

"What do you mean?" Jake said, returning his hand to his side.

"It's just that.. you know. I'm Asian and you're white. I'm really nervous on how our wedding is going to look."

"Oh, Nicky. You're worried about nothing. It can be disorganized as hell and I'd still be happy because I'm marrying you."

She felt more eased. Nicole loved it when he comforted her. The feeling was like an ocean wave had swept over her feet. Calming yet so comforting.

"Thanks babe." She said, turning her head to smile at him, replied to with a bright pearly white smile from her husband.

ACT 2, SCENE 1 – FLASHBACK, FIRST PERSON JOURNAL, NICOLE

I had just gotten to North Island yesterday afternoon. My god, the warm air and sun makes me feel like I'm on vacation or something.

"Looks like we have ourselves another lady pilot!"

I turned my head. There's a 6'1 man coming towards me. Who could this be? Is he talking to me? Surely, he is.

He extended his hand to me. Do I shake it? Reluctantly, I did.

"Nicole. Callsign's Dragon. And you?"

"The name's Hangman, but you can call me yours."

Oh my god. Did I just get hit on within my first HOUR of being here? Yes, I did. I just decided to forget about it.

Later that evening, my new friends Natasha and Callie took me to a bar. It was called The Hard Deck, I think? Really funny name. Fitting for a Navy bar, I guess.

But what do you know it, when I walk in, guess who I see? That blonde man from earlier.

For the first fifteen minutes, I tried my best to bury my head in conversation with Natasha and Callie. Their callsigns were Phoenix and Halo, which I thought was super cool. Dragon, Phoenix, Halo, the best female pilots in the nation, damn right.

I couldn't get him off of my mind though. So I told them what happened earlier, and they told me to go strike up a conversation with him. I don't regret it at all.

I walked up to the bar where he was sitting, pulled out the stool next to him, and sat down. He looked up.

"Well, who do we have here? You're that lady pilot from earlier today. Dragon, right?"

"How did you even remember all of that?"

"I'm magic, darling."

I couldn't help but blush. Darling? Please, this sounded like a cheesy romance novel that I would be forced to read for junior high English class.

"Whatever. But uh, yeah. I thought about what you said earlier. I respect you for having the guts to be that outgoing."

He chuckled. His teeth were perfect. I really can't lie, he's gorgeous.

"You, uh, never really told me your name either. You just told me your callsign. So.. yeah.."

"The name's Jake. Jake Seresin."

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Jake Seresin."

And that is the start of how I got a date for this Friday. For the second only time in my life, I'm dating somebody. Maybe someday, I'll marry somebody too.

Nicole, August 24, 2019

ACT 3, SCENE 1 – 3 DAYS LATER, WEDDING DAY

Nicole closed the journal and set it on the table of the vanity. She re-read the entry from her first day at Naval Air Station North Island, reminiscing on her first encounters with her soon-to-be husband.

"I can't believe the last line became reality. It's like it was just yesterday." she said to her sister, Josephine, who was curling her hair with a hot curling iron.

Nicole was wearing a white Áo dài with a white headpiece too, as per the Vietnamese tradition.

Josephine turned off the curling iron and helped Nicole get up from her chair.

"You're looking so beautiful, all dolled up like this, Nicky. You're a big, strong woman now." She said, giving her sister a bear hug.

"Thank you. Thank you so much, Joey. It's like yesterday we were just playing dollhouse in the basement, and now I'm getting married."

Both smiled at each other. "Go on out there girl. He's waiting."

Nicole walked out of the dressing room, and moved in between the arms of her parents, Uyen Kim and Han Hoang. They were so moved by the sight of their daughter marrying a man that makes her happy and content with life.

Nicole couldn't help but tear up when she looked out into the room and crowd. The wedding hall was clearly decorated with Vietnamese and western influence, paying homage to both families.

And there in the distance, she saw Jake waiting for her at the altar. Dressed in his Navy whites, he looked like the most handsome man in the world in Nicole's eyes.

When they reached the altar, her parents let go of her arms, and returned to their pew, as Nicole walked up to Jake, holding a bouquet of flowers. She saw the tears coming out of his eyes too.

In the congregation as Hangman's groomsmen were Rooster, Coyote, Payback, Fritz, Harvard, and Omaha. Nicole's bridespeople were Phoenix, Halo, and disregarding the traditional gender binaries, she also had Bob, Fanboy, and Yale. Also in the congregation was Penny and her daughter, Amelia.

"You look good, baby." said Jake, smiling at her and wiping her tears with his fingers.

"You look good too, baby." said Nicole.

When the time came to place rings on each other's fingers, Jake started to see all of their happiest memories together.

When he used his umbrella to cover her during a rainstorm, sacrificing his own uniform for her own comfort, and when he carried her back home on his back after an exhausting work day.

And as the minister had them recite their vows, Nicole started to see all of their memories flash before her eyes too.

The sunset drives where they sung along to Taylor Swift's "Our Song", the bar games where he always won, and the hugs that he would give her in front of their friends, not having a single worry in the world about embarrassing themselves.

"And now, you may kiss the bride." the minister said.

Jake leaned in to kiss her, finally landing a loving, gentle kiss on her lips. So moved, so loved, and so now married.

The congregation erupted in clapping and cheering.

"I can't believe they actually worked out." said Rooster, who was seconded by Phoenix and Coyote.

After a few full seconds, Nicole and Jake finally let go of each other's lips.

Looking each other in the eye, Nicole said,

"What spell did you cast on me to make me fall in love with you?" she said, smiling through tears and at this point, full sobbing.

"You know me. I'm magic, darling." he said, smiling back at her.

[anghraine]

Fic author interview (meme)

I was tagged by @incognitajones! Thank you very much <3

1- How many works do you have on AO3?

222, though some are very closely interconnected.

2- What's your total AO3 word count?

1,193,545, says the AO3 statistics page!

o_O

3- What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

LOL, I had just automatically rearranged my stats graph to rank fics by kudos instead of hits. It's:

Season of Courtship (inevitably), a Darcy/Elizabeth canon-compliant engagement interquel I wrote as a teenager;

But Thou Didst Not Leave His Soul In Hell (always a pleasant surprise), a short AU in which Luke convinces Anakin/Vader to flee the Empire with him;

per ardua ad astra, a Rogue One+ANH Jyn/Cassian AU in which Jyn, Cassian, and Bodhi escape Scarif only to get trapped on the Death Star and forced to pass themselves off as Imperials;

we get dark, only to shine, a longggg yet unfinished AU of The Borgias in which Cesare and Lucrezia begin their affair during S1 instead of S3 (CW for canon sibling incest, murder, etc).

Contradictions and Varieties (baffling), a short Darcy/Elizabeth AU I wrote for a fest in which it takes them slightly longer to get together.

4- Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try, especially with fics I'm actively updating, but I'm always behind on it. I mostly just get distracted and forget.

5- What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

Oh, interesting question! I don't write a lot of angsty endings, but there are a few options, and I think it probably would have to be the gift of men, a short (~1k) Fourth Age fic in which Eldarion goes along with a politically convenient marriage to one of Faramir and Éowyn's daughters, and falls in love with her, only for her to die of old age while Aragorn and Faramir are still alive and Eldarion remains young.

Honorable mentions: Set On This Path (Luke and Leia are brought up in the Empire + fusion with the story of the bloodbending brothers in B1 of Legend of Korra, complete with murder-suicide) and the last day (a chirpy epistolary fic that takes an abrupt turn after the genocidal attack that begins the Guild Wars games).

6- What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

Um, just considering the ones that have endings, to be fair, and ... hmm, that's harder. A lot of happy endings! Probably the ones that are happiest for me, personally, are First Impressions (m!Elizabeth/f!Darcy re-telling of P&P) and whatever we deny or embrace (f!Cassian/Jyn).

7- Do you write crossovers?

Not often, but sometimes! Like now.

8- Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Yes! I've gotten hate more than once wrt Season of Courtship in various versions (even before it become so overwhelmingly the popular favorite of my fics). The rest has been on other fics and mostly on ff.net.

TBH the subtler stuff bothers me more than outright hate (corrections based on adaptations or fanon or expanded universe material I already said I wasn't using, concern that I might switch permanently to a new format I'm trying out, etc).

9- Do you write smut?

Very rarely. I respect people who can write good smut (hi incognita!), but I'm definitely a fade to black sort unless the ship is already so out there that I'm long past feeling self-conscious about it.

10- Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes. It's happened a couple of times, but the main one was someone who stole a few Austen fics from various people and tried to piece them together into something they could sell on Amazon. One of the fics was The Rich Are Always Respectable (not what I would choose to plagiarize if I were going to, but ... okay).

11- Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, several times. I think it's cool!

12- Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I wrote a short fic with my friend @tulinlina many years ago :)

13- What's your all-time favorite ship?

Darcy/Elizabeth. Truly this ship is the terror of the seas!

14- What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

Oh, man. This probably requires more self-knowledge than I really have. Um ... I hate saying it, but we get dark, only to shine is likely this. I had so many plans for where it was going to go, but I'm just in a very different fannish place these days.

15- What are your writing strengths?

It feels weird to say, but I think I write solid dialogue (it's certainly my favorite thing to write!) and fairly clean prose in general.

16- What are your writing weaknesses?

Description is my truest nemesis—I tend to place scenes in just empty or vaguely described space. Fight scenes and that sort of thing are really difficult (for related reasons). Finishing things—my stuff nearly always grows out of control and it screws up pacing and so on.

17- What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

A little goes a long way, IMO. I did a bit of it in my fic about Leia and Cassian and Alderaanian, in tongues and quiet sighs, so I can't judge it too hard, but it's very much something to handle with care (especially with conlangs—Tolkien fic can be pretty grating this way).

18- What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Tolkien! My first attempt at a fic was a Faramir-goes-to-Rivendell-instead-of-Boromir AU that never got very far.

Well, my first serious attempt at fanfic, that is—I wrote original stuff for years before that, and I guess technically I tried to write Trixie Belden fanfic when I was about 10 ... and the original stuff spun off from a piece that was basically a Secret of Mana fanfic I wrote even before the Trixie Belden stuff. But in terms of something written within a fandom community, the Faramir fic.

19- What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet but want to?

Hmm. I'm not sure, actually. I mostly just write stuff if I feel like it. Oh—it's cheating, but I've barely written Korra/Kuvira even though I adore the ship. I'd like to write a proper Korvira fic someday.

20- What's your favorite fic you've written?

This changes pretty often, though there are always a few that come up when I'm asked. At this moment in time, probably The Jedi and the Sith Lord, the third (sort of) of my f!Luke Skywalker fics, and the one where the story finally swerves off the canon tracks and becomes its own thing. Maybe (probably?) not my best work, but the Lucyverse is my baby and I think TJATSL is my best work in it.

Tagging: @elwing, @kareenvorbarra, @heckofabecca, @veliseraptor, @rain-sleet-snow

[ultraericthered]

Other points worth addressing:

I still can’t get over how it had the First Order essentially take over the Galaxy within the blink of an eye after their major trump card had been blown up without even a hint about how the fuck they accomplished it.

What’s funny about this is it’s sort of a mirror version of what happened in the transition from ANH to TESB - it was established in ANH that the only thing the Empire had to keep the galaxy in line with its tyrannical rule was fear of the Death Star, so once the Death Star was blown up, the Empire had no more leverage and would have to surrender or be overthrown. Yet by TESB, they’re still ruling the galaxy as though nothing had happened and are in fact even more threatening now than they were with the Death Star. So now the outcome of TFA should have meant that the Republic would not have to surrender or be overthrown, yet in TLJ, they’ve been overthrown and the First Order reigns supreme.

to the point that Rose gave him a lecture on the evils of slavery.

Had to go back and check where this happened, and...it didn’t. You might be confused with Rose bringing Finn’s attention to the ugly practices that the prettiness and privileges of Canto Bight and the wealthy people there are derived from, including war profiteering, child labor, animal cruelty, and yes, sometimes slavery, but that wasn’t the focal point. Finn knows the evils of child slavery, he just had no idea that what he was seeing at that casino resort had any link to those evils until Rose let him know, and even that was hardly a “lecture” to him.

I still can’t get over how it split up the two characters who had the most on-screen chemistry and one of the most well-developed relationships from the previous film.

It was actually TFA that split them up at the very end, leaving Finn in a coma at the Resistance base while Rey went off to find Luke. Obviously I would’ve rather they’d reunited prior to the events aboard the Supremacy rather than take ‘til the very end to see each other again, but Rian called the shots here, not me.

still can’t get over how the only additional bit of worldbuilding–Canto Bight–went out of its way to establish that the rich and powerful of the Galaxy do not give a single fuck about which side of conflict wins, further cementing the impression that the rest of the Galaxy is just kind of…getting on with their lives. That, beyond the personal stakes for the characters we see on-screen, none of what’s happening actually matters.

I can see why that would be jarring and it didn’t make much sense to me at first too, but after time and especially after TRoS, I think I get it better - Snoke was among that rich and powerful of the Galaxy and he had bought off several of them to ensure the real stakes of the conflict be supressed and the rest of the Galaxy just look at it as a big game because that’s what Palpatine wanted him to do. The First Order and their warring with the Resistance was, above all else, a huge public distraction so that the Final Order could be fully constructed and strike at a time no planet would be ready for it.

Listen, if you liked TLJ, more power to you. But I can't help but resent it more and more the longer time goes by.

I still can't get over how it had the First Order essentially take over the Galaxy within the blink of an eye after their major trump card had been blown up without even a hint about how the fuck they accomplished it.

I still can't get over how the New Republic went from the major power in the Galaxy to consisting of, like, a dozen people practically overnight with no explanation.

I still can't get over how Finn's past as a stormtrooper who was kidnapped and enslaved as a child was used as a plot device but basically ignored in terms of his characterization, to the point that Rose gave him a lecture on the evils of slavery.

I still can't get over how it split up the two characters who had the most on-screen chemistry and one of the most well-developed relationships from the previous film.

I still can't get over how the only meaningful way it advanced the plot was by killing off the Big Bad.

I still can't get over how the stakes felt like the mid-season episode of a TV series and not the second film in a trilogy.

I still can't get over how the only additional bit of worldbuilding--Canto Bight--went out of its way to establish that the rich and powerful of the Galaxy do not give a single fuck about which side of conflict wins, further cementing the impression that the rest of the Galaxy is just kind of...getting on with their lives. That, beyond the personal stakes for the characters we see on-screen, none of what's happening actually matters.

Like, TFA has issues too. It's fundamentally a soft reboot and not really a sequel. But TLJ also felt like a soft reboot instead of a sequel. It had the chance to build up the bare bones established by TFA...and it tore them down instead.

And then I still have people trying to make out like it's a moral failing, or a sign of being some lore-obsessed loser with bad taste, that I didn't like it.

It's very, very frustrating.

[burr-ell]

You've never seen the prequel trilogy before??? My dude, you must elaborate on this, I need DETAILS. 👀

confession time: prior to TFA, i hadn't seen any star wars movie in full before, except maybe ANH. star wars has just always been part of pop culture and my brother and dad both loved it, so i sort of absorbed most of it by osmosis. i loved a lot of the ideas of it and i think i even had all of them on dvd, but i'd never actually thought about, like...actually sitting down and watching them the whole way through and paying attention because what am i, a neurotypical?

then @tarisilmarwen started gushing about the obi-wan miniseries and how good it was. i couldn't swing a dead lothcat (it's heavy cultural osmosis) without hitting an obi-wan meta. so i decided to put on my clown makeup, swallow my anti-rodent pride, and pay rickey rat for the privilege.

but see, when you give your money to rickey rat, he gives you an entire menu full of nothing but star wars, having determined based on years of carefully curated market data exactly what you'll do when confronted with a massive library of brightly-colored shiny choices. you say you only wanted one, but did you really? look, it's r2d2! and i, knowing full well i was playing right into his grubby white capitalist gloves, figured "yeah, alright, as long as i'm here". i'm only human, and sometimes the squishy lump of meat housed in my skull desperately wants to binge-watch the five stages of grief as told by laser swords.

so what i didn't do was watch the obi-wan miniseries in isolation. what i DID do was watch the last two episodes of the clone wars, then revenge of the sith, and then the obi-wan miniseries. and then the other two prequels just for more context, and then revenge of the sith again because you can't just end a binge-watch on attack of the clones. (but i freely admit, on that second watch i mostly just skipped to the child murder and cgi sword fights. i came here for angst and i'm not leaving til i get my money's worth.)

i think this is like the star wars equivalent of when you go through a break-up and eat ice cream out of the tub and listen to nothing but lana del rey, except i did all this because i really wanted to see Silver Fox Ewan McGregor being a sad puppy for five hours. i can hear colors, and they sound like lightsabers.

[obionekenobi]

Obi-Wan Kenobi Predictions

We’re four episodes in with two to go, so let’s talk about the various places the plot can go from here:

Leia and Obi-Wan

It’s been pretty well established at this point that Leia and Obi-Wan have bonded, and that this bond is going to play a role in the future.

So, what could this mean for the final two episodes? I think we can safely expect more bonding moments as Obi-Wan delivers her back to Bail. I’m assuming that the quest ends in episode 6, with some more peril between episodes 5 and 6 to overcome. I’m also assuming their parting will be the final scene (or penultimate scene) of the show as a whole. I also think this scene will imply some form of further contact for them (although it may also imply that Obi-Wan will never be able to speak to her again for her own safety).

I think her reaction to him in ANH implies that she remembers him, so I don’t think this time in her life will be one she forgets or never thinks about again.

Reva

We end episode four with Reva revealing to Vader that she had planted a tracker on Leia’s droid with the intention on hunting down and delivering both Obi-Wan and the fledging rebellion to him. So, we’re obviously going to see the fallout of this, with the forces of the empire converging on the rebellion. It’s pretty clear Reva is gonna be part of this as well.

Reva’s overall goal here is to gain Vader’s approval, and ultimately I don’t think she’s going to get it: she’s either going to die in the final episode, or is going to be let down by Vader in some major way. Based on the episodes so far I’m leaning towards the first, but the second may be possible if an emotional direction is established in episode five that could draw her away from Vader. It’s also possible that Vader himself will kill her, which would be on brand for him.

I think if there’s any thread to pull here regarding a potential Reva redemption, it would probably be the hint given regarding the inquisitors being Jedi who have been turned. If Reva overcomes conditioning or any other sort of hurt connected to Jedi, she may go on the path of a redemption arc. This may be a bit far fetched, but I wonder if she was included in that group of children who were running away during Order 66 in the show’s first scene. The scene seemed very deliberately turning our attention to these children, which makes me think they’ll come back into the story in some form, possibly with Reva (if she’s young enough for the timeline to fit).

If that is true, it would make the absolutely chilling shot of the child’s preserved body in the Jedi tomb all that more horrifying: it implies that the surviving Jedi had no choice but to either die, or turn, no matter how young they were.

Vader

When it comes to Vader, I think our biggest question will be whether or not he and Obi-Wan will face off in another duel. It’s certainly possible: Vader very much wants to find and kill him himself, and I assume he’ll be personally involved in the attack that will follow the tracker put on Leia.

However, if I had to guess, I don’t think it’ll happen again. I think the next time they fight will be Obi-Wan’s death in ANH. In fact, I even doubt they’ll have a great deal of interaction at all: I think Obi-Wan will try to avoid being put in that situation again. He may have a conversation as some sort of closure, but I don’t think they’ll go in that direction. While I would prefer more interactions between them, I think they’ll be sparing with them to heighten the stakes of what would come in the future with ANH.

Ultimately, I think Vader’s role in this show is to function as a symbol for Obi-Wan’s failure and as a goal for Reva to strive towards, and any further use of him will be to fulfill one of these storylines.

Force sensitive children

I just want to address this quick reference briefly. It was mentioned earlier in the show that the Empire is hunting down and stealing force sensitive children, and children in general seem to be the heart of this show. I think this thread will be referenced or it will be brought back to connect the show to another SW property with regards to where this practice goes.

Within the Kenobi show, it is possible that the next episode will have them run into a facility that houses these children, and it’ll showcase a scene or mini arc of them freeing these children. Thematically, it would work to restore Obi-Wan’s confidence and show him that he can still help people. It would also bring home that his new role is now specifically to protect children (Luke and Leia in particular) and accept this calling.

Outside of the show, it’s possible this plot will tie into why the empire was after Grogu so aggressively during The Mandalorian. It may also be the prototype for Finn’s origin story two generations later: a force sensitive child stolen from his family and raised to work for an evil empire.

The resistance

Finally, the show has started introducing elements of what will later become the resistance of the original trilogy. I believe the Path will later become or be folded into The Resistance, and thus the final two episodes will feature them significantly as they fight to survive and carry on helping others escape from the empire. I think the show will be a turning point for them, where they ultimately commit to fighting the empire head on.

If this is the case, it implies that Obi-Wan played an important role in forming or adding to the Resistance of the original trilogy, which is pretty significant and cements his legacy within the fight of freeing the galaxy from the empire he feels at least partially responsible for creating.

[vagrantblvrd]

So, that time Rebel Alliance pilot Luke Skywalker was on patrol with Wedge  sometime between ANH and Empire and had a run-in with a pre-Imperial gunship registered as the Razor Crest???

Pew-pew dogfight in which the Crest didn’t fire on them which is always nice, but it sure as hell attempted to evade - Luke and Wedge being like, oh, they’re good - and then surprise!Imperial ships, because I cannot not do ridiculous Drama.

Razor Crest and Luke’s X-wing both get hit, go down over a thickly forested nearby planet. Wedge is forced to break off and report back to the Allince - Imperial ships this close to their Rebel base? Apparently more likely than you’d think.

Meanwhile Luke is surveying the wreckage of his X-wing trying to see what he can salvage and whatnot. He has faith Wedge got away safely, because it’s Wedge and he’s one of the best pilots in the Alliance, but any rescue efforts won’t arrive for days, so.

He manages to get Artoo onto solid ground, tries not to smile as Artoo keeps up a steady stream of complaints the whole time because Skywalkers!!1!, kind of the worst, really.

Sometime later he hears blaster fire and looks toward the direction it seemed to come from, and is like.

Hmm.

Because the Razor Crest and if he survived a crash landing on this planet it’s possible the other pilot did too. (Mainly the blaster fire though, seeing as the planet seems largely uninhabited, and anyway. What are the odds it would be anyone else when they went down in roughly the same area.)

So.

Luke could make camp here, stick close to his X-wing which would make it easier for anyone to come looking for him, but also, also.

The surprise!Imperial ships who shot him down and might come looking to finish the job, and anyway, anyway, he’s got one of his Feelings he should search out the other pilot.

Which, you know, he does.

In spite of Artoo’s protests and predictions of gloom and doom, and anyway, it’s better than doing nothing, so.

Off they go, having little adventures here and there because local flora and fauna and that time Luke had to rescue Artoo getting stuck in a giant spiderweb the two of them getting the hell out of there before whatever made it comes to check on it.

They have to stop to make camp for the night and it’s while Luke’s setting up a fire that they hear blaster fire again, something roaring, and other such ounds that indictate someone is possibly having a worse day than they are.

Luke goes to see what it is, Artoo like what, why, and also Skywalkers >:((((((((( but follows Luke anyway because no way is he going to be left behind.

A rescue is attempted, but Din is being attacked by a large predator (I’m picturing something like a cave bear, but maybe  little bigger???) that seems to be impervious to blasters and determined as hell, and would you look at that? There’s  a handy little cave right over there with an entrance large enough for them and Artoo to fit through but too small for the large predator, and anyway, they’re not dumb.

Luke points the cave out, Din is like ??? because where the hell did he come from, but then the Alliance flight-suit and oh, right, and anyway. Din’s the one in armor so it makes sense that he covers Luke’s run to the cave.

And when the large predator takes a swipe of Din that sends him flying, Luke scrambles to get him into the cave and maybe kind of taps into his Force abilities to knock the large predator away long enough for them to get to safety.

Plot Reasons and all.

From there it’s Luke ~fretting over an unconscious Mandalorian while Artoo mutters to himself and overall it a very odd day indeed.

Luke’s exploring the cave, looking for another way out seeing as how the large predator is still outside and looks like it’s going to wait the out when Din wakes up.

He finds several dead ends and a pool fed from snow melt from the look of it, so they won’t have to worry about water, which is the first bit of good news.

(Rebel Alliance and survival courses and having to relocate bases whenever the Imperials find them so he’s picked up some things since leaving Tatooine, so yes.)

Luke makes his way back to the main room of the cave to find the Mandalorian and Artoo in a  standoff of some sort.

“Oh, good,” Luke says, careful to keep his hands in clear view, and doesn’t make any sudden moves. “You’re awake.”

Din is like.

He’s tired and sore, got knocked around in the crash and then had the bad luck to run afoul of the large predator and now this.

(Also, he’s pretty sure he has a concussion on top of everything, so.)

No love for the Empire and all, but no desire to fall in with the Rebels either, he just wants to go about his own business, live his life and so on.

He wasn’t even doing anything questionably legal when the X-wings slid up alongside the Crest. Was minding his own damn business and just.

Bad day all around.

Still, at least the Rebel pilot didn’t remove his helmet - one of the first things he made sure of, because of course he did.

They muddle their way into a truce/understanding between them for the time being seeing as how they’re stuck in the cave and all.

Din is sure he can handle the large predator, but concussion and all, and anyway, he’s still tired enough that the Rebel’s suggestion he get more rest before he throws himself at it doesn’t sound like a bad idea.

Luke shares rations from his emergency kit, and Din likewise salvaged what he could from the Crest before he ran into the large predator.

The good news is they have food and water that should last long enough for any search parties sent for Luke -

And, okay, Luke’s not stupid. Notices the way the Mandalorian goes so very still when Luke says that, just thinking out loud as you do, and sighs.

Guy probably falls more on Han’s side of legal activities than Luke’s, has no reason to be happy about the Rebels coming to the rescue, but he doesn’t know what to about it for now.

(Thinks in the back of his mind that if worst comes to worst, he can always get Han aboard for a tiny little jailbreak. Probably.)

Anyway.

There’s not a lot of talking from them, but it’s not as awkward as Luke thought it might be. The Mandalorian actually answers his questions, when he feels like it

By the third day Luke wouldn’t cal them friends, but they’re not quite enemies and that’s better than he was expecting given the circumstances.

And then there’ the thing where they think it’s safe to leave the cave, but surprise, it’s not!

Large predator is still around and there is a fairly epic fight to chase it off or kill it if that’s what it takes, but Din’s leg gets a little broken and Luke gets a little knocked around and Artoo doesn’t have a great time of it either, what with getting tossed around like a chew toy when he caused a distraction to save the humans.

Anyway, anyway, they end up killing it thanks to teamwork and then it’s a matter of sorting everything out.

Luke’s got bacta in his emergency kit, but not enough to help with Din’s leg or other injuries between them, but Din, okay, Din.

Might have some back on the Crest, but he’s in no shape to make it there now, and no knowing if there are more of those large predators around, and Luke is like.

He’s still mobile, he’ll go.

Din is like, are you that stupid? To which Luke is like, kinda, yeah.

He knows Din’s not fond of droids, hasn’t made it a secret, but the terrain is tricky enough as it is for Artoo, and he’s worried about Din, and just.

He leaves Artoo with Din and goes off on his little trek to the Razor Crest.

Takes him half a day before he gets there and when he does it’s clear the ship has seen better days, but he’s pretty sure it can be fixed made flyable again.

If, you know, Din could get his hands on metal plates to patch up holes in the Crest’s hull.

(Conveniently, Luke happens to know where there’s a crashed X-wing that could be salvged for parts, allow Din to make his way off-planet without having to deal with the Rebel Alliance at all, but that’s a thought for another day.)

Luke finds the bacta and heads back to the cave. Treats Din’s lefg first, the most serious injury to deal with -

“No,” Din says, when Luke’s about to use it all on Din’s leg, because Luke’s got some nasty injuries himself and they’re likely to get infected if he doesnt do something about them, and anyway, it’ll take longer for Din’s leg to heal than any of their other injuries, don’t waste the stuff like that.

And then!

Luke broaches the possibility of fixing the Crest by cannibalizing his X-wing, which has Din looking at him sharply.

The whole Rebel Alliance and underdogs who probably can’t afford to just waste resources, but Luke, okay, Luke.

He just looks at Din and is like, no, no, it’s fine.

(Because the whole survival situation they’re in and risking their lives for one another and this the leas Luke can do for him, alright? So just accept it already.)

Also, it’s been...a little too long since they crashed on this planet and at the very least the Alliance should have contacted him, but it’s been radio silence and Luke would rather not think about why that is. (Yet, anyway, yet.)

Anyway, the next morning Luke sets off to his X-wing to strip it for parts for the Razor Crest. Apologizes, because she’s been good for him, kept him alive since Yavin and the Death Star and thinks she understand, hopes she would anyway, because he owes Din this much, and anyway, anyway, yes.

It takes most of the morning to get everything he can off his X-wing, and then a little longer to fashion a sled to carry parts and whatnot to the Crest.

Stops at the cave to check on Din and Artoo and have lunch. Tell him how it’s going and so on, and Din is quiet as he does.

A little too much, really, even though he’s still not the chatty sort.

“I’m going with you,” he tells Luke when Luke gets ready to head back to the Crest with parts from his X-wing.

When Luke tells him why that’s not a great idea - number one reason being that Din’s leg is still broken - Din shuts him down by saying “It’s my ship.”

Which, not what he means, but Luke gets it, he does.

Thinks Din’s an idiot, but also knows he’d just follow Luke on his own if he doesn’t help him, and just.

It’s less trouble to agree help him hobble along with him rather than risk Din making his leg worse, so.

He has Artoo tow the sled with the parts while he plays human crutch for Din and they make their slow, awkward way to Din’s ship.

It takes a while, because of course, the three of them reaching the Razor Crest at dusk. Thankfully the ship is safe enough to use it for shelter, and Luke lets Din rattle around inside while he secures the parts outside.

Dinner is a quiet affair, Luke and Din exhausted after a long day, but comfortable.

Luke talks about his plans to bring the rest of the parts back the next day, and Din doesn’t quite fidget but it’s pretty obvious he’s not entirely comfortable with this. (Being indebted to Luke, which this isn’t about that at all, but it feels like it is.)

Anyway, next day Luke goes off to his X-wing for the last of the parts and whatnot, and is like oh, no, when he sees TIE fighters in the distance, like they’re looking for something.

Seem to be headed in the opposite direction from Din and the Crest, but he knows better than to think that will be the case for long. Hurries back to Din adn Artoo as fast as he can to find they’ve already started on the repairs.

Luke tells Din about the TIE fighters and it isn’t as though they hadn’t considered it, the Imperials searching the planet for them, or course not. Just. That hope the Imperials dismissed them as not worth the effort to hunt down and the whatnot.

So.

They focus on repairing the ship, working through the night and such in a Montage Sequence, because of course there’s one.

There’s a short test flight just in case, Din letting Luke fly the ship because Plot Reasons, and there’s actual light-hearted bantering going on - Luke, Mr. Fancypants fighter pilot giving Din and his clunky heavy gunship grief while Din may or may not be rolling his eyes at him and enjoying his company - TIE fighters show up.

And it’s like, well, this is unexpected, but also not.

Another exciting pew-pew dogfight takes place, this time with Luke flying the Crest and Din is so conflicted because his ship??? But also Luke is doing a dam fine job of flying it even though he’s not used to the way it handles or its limitations and anyway, anyway.

They get rid of the TIEs and share a look like oh my God, we’re still alive??? which is when a second wave of TIEs show up, and there are so many of them and they’re not going to make it?

So they decide to make a push for space, se if they can jump to hyperspace and all, but there’s an star destroyer in space and entire squadrons of TIEs and it’s not looking great for them?

Which of course is the perfect moment for the cavalry in the form of the Rebel Alliance to pop up.

Or, like. The rest of Rogue squadron and one Corellian freighter and Luke has never been so glad to see them as they keep the TIE fighters off their back long enough for everyone to make the jump to hyperspace.

They make several quick hops to avoid leading the Imperials back to the new Rebel base - they had to relocate yet again after Wedge reported back, too risky not to, which was what took them so long to come back for Luke.

Poor Din is Not Happy at the fact they have a squadron of X-wings flying escort with the Falcon - he is also Not Thinking about who the owner of that ship is or why Luke seems so happy to see them and what even is going on with the Alliance these days - because the whole thing of how this whole mess started?

So Luke is like, “Hey, so,” to Han and the others, and the Rogues stay on guard in space as he lands the Razor Crest on a nearby planet, Han and Chewie following in the Falcon.

Luke is like, so that was fun, right? as he gives Din this little smile, kind of awkward because the Rebels could use someone like him but Din’s made it clear he’s not interested, and anyway, that’s not the point, really.

They say their goodbyes and Luke goes over to join Han and Chewie and Din is like. He doesn’t know what, but following the Falcon out of atmo and getting an X-wing escort until he umps into hyperpace to wherever wasn’t it.

Also, don’t think he doesn’t notice the way Alliance ships leave him and the Razoe Crest alone after that, Skywalker, Din’s onto you.

But yes.

Din goes back to doing his thing and maybe thinks about that whole standed on a random planet with a Rebel Alliance pilot when he sees the mismatced panels and whatnot on the Crest that came from a cannibalized X-wing.

(Also, the little metal ball Grogu is fixated on may or may not have come from Luke’s X-wing in a please let me have this kind of moment of sentimental nonsense what with it surviving the destruction of the Razor Crest and all, memento with double the sentimental nonsense for Din because reasons.)

They don’t see one another again until Gideon’s cruiser, but every so often Luke hears about this one Mandalorian and a pre-Imperial gunship Adventuring about. Din hears about this guy named Skywalker, and when most people scoff and say the stories must be exaggerated, Rebel propaganda, Din wonders, doesn’t put it past Luke to be honest.

And then!

Gideon’s cruiser and “Are you a Jedi?” and Luke is like  “I am,” and Din is like, okay, but when did that happen because I don’t recall that being a thing before. Grogu is like !!! and :DDDDDDDDD because Luke’s a Jedi like him and dad is all warm and squishy feelings in the Force right now, and so on.

Luke is like, well this changes things because he can’t just take Grogu and scurry off now that he’s seen what a strong bond he has with Din, and also Din, so he invites Din to come with them to his Jedi school and Din doesn’t have to think twice about it, you know?

The three of them scurry off to Luke’s Jedi school somewhere, Din taking one of the shuttles.

It’s all kinds of awkward on the trip there, Din a little concerned about how this is going to work out, but turns out he didn’t need to worry because Luke is still Luke after everything.

Still that pilot he met way back when, the one who traded off with Din on the saving one another’s lives thing and sacrificing his ship to give Din his and so on, and it’s like.

He never expected to see Luke again - fighter pilot’s life expectancy in a war and all - but here they are and it’s kind of nice actually.

No survival situation now, so the return of that awkward flirting thing that was barely an idea the by end the first time they met, both of them aware of how ridiculous they’re being but hey, not like anyone’s there to see it.

(Aside from Grogu and Artoo, but shhh, Luke and Din are pretending the two of them aren’t laughing at them all day everyday.)

the awkward flirting intensifies until the day Din presses his forehead against Luke’s, no big dramatic moment leading up to it, just this instinctive little thing, warm and comfortable and natural as anything.

When Din moves away, Luke looks up at him with this expression on his face, little smirk forming, and Din knows, okay, he knows Luke -

“I admit my understanding of Mandalorian culture is lacking, but doe this mean we’re married now?”

And it’s like.

The man is so infuriating? But they’ve also been co-habitating and co-parenting Grogu for almost a year now, become familiar with one another’s habits and quirks and somehow haven’t killed one another over the most annoying ones.

Luke’s friends and family who stop by to check in on him - them - almost definitely have a betting pool on them. (Solo for sure, even if the man still does the I’m Watching You thing to Din every time he visits.)

“Yes,” Din answers, dry as anything, because when it comes down to it they pretty much already are.

[dalekofchaos]

Rey’s lack of motivation and stake in the Sequel Trilogy

I have a question to ask you. What are Rey’s motivations? What are her wants and goals and why is she even drawn to the conflict between The First Order and The Resistance?

Rey’s motivations in the Sequels.

Rey wants to find her parents.

Wants to bring back Luke Skywalker

Rey wants to find her place 

Wants Ben to return to the light

Has no real motivation to be on either side of the conflict, but chooses The Resistance anyway

Says she wants to kill Palpatine in cold blood, was close to giving in

Now she chose to fuck off to Tatooine and we see very little in her motivation to do....ANYTHING

Let’s compare Anakin and Luke’s motivations.

What are Anakin's motivations?

Wants to leave a life of slavery and come back and free his mother

Wants to become a Jedi and become a hero

Wants to protect Padme

Wants to save Obi-Wan

Wants to stop Dooku and end the war before it can begin

Wants to be a good master to Ahsoka

Wants to clear Ahsoka’s name

Wants to stop the war

Wants to save Padme and his children's lives at the cost of the Jedi and doing whatever it takes and becomes Darth Vader

What are Luke’s motivations?

Luke is a farm boy who dreams of leaving his mundane life.

Luke discovers that his father -unlike what his uncle told him, was a heroic Jedi Knight

Luke, is reluctant and refuses the ‘call to adventure’, but after the Empire murders his Aunt and Uncle, he decides to Join Obi-Wan on the quest.

Save the Princess

Luke is angered by Obi-Wan’s death at the hands of Darth Vader, and seeks retribution.

Destroy the Death Star and save the Rebellion

To be trained by Yoda

Save Han and Leia

Luke discovers his father, the heroic Jedi, is none other than Darth Vader. After years of training, he sets out to redeem his father and turn him back to the light.

After the redemption of his father and fall of the Empire, Luke goes on a journey to restore The Jedi Order

Compare Rey and Luke’s journeys in ANH and TFA. Rey wanders around and stuff is handed to her. Luke takes initiative and works for what he has. Let's compare ANH with TFA

Luke screws up on watching R2, then chooses to chase him down. He makes another mistake by spying on the Tusken Raiders instead of getting the hell out of dodge. This leads to him being knocked out, and rescued by Ben Kenobi.

Luke initiates the meeting with Ben Kenobi, and it happens because of his early bad decisions.

His aunt & uncle are killed, but thanks to his screw-up with R2 & the raiders, he and the droids are spared.

He chooses to follow Kenobi to Alderaan instead of staying on Tattooine.

He chooses to accept Kenobi's instruction in the ways of the Force, even though most people think it's a myth and a joke. Even though he's bad at it and doesn't seem to get any results at first.

He makes the decision that they're going to rescue Leia, potentially dooming their escape from the Death Star. This sets off a chain of events that leads to Kenobi's death.

Then he chooses to help fight the Death Star, even though he's not a member of the rebellion. He was offered a job with Han, and he could have ensured his safety by leaving with them. Instead he chose certain death.

Finally, he chooses to trust a literal voice in his head instead of the targeting computer.

Let's contrast that with Rey.

BB-8 runs into her. She tries to send him away, but relents and lets him follow her home.

She chooses not to sell him for food.

Finn wanders into camp on his own initiative.

The camp is attacked because BB-8 is there. The camp would have been attacked no matter what Rey did. The other scavenger was, I'm pretty sure, from the same camp. And if she'd sold him, BB-8 would also have still been in the camp.

She is forced to take the Millennium Falcon when the ship she wanted to use was blown up.

She chooses to go with Finn and bring BB-8 to the Rebellion Resistance.

She stumbles upon Luke's lightsaber, and runs away from it.

She accidentally runs into Kylo Ren while hiding in the forest.

He chooses to kidnap her because he senses something special about her.

After her first exposure to the Force, she learns how to use some of it, successfully, and escapes from Ren. And to her credit, escaping and trying the Force out is a choice she made, rather than something that passively happened to her.

Then she, um, is standing there when Han is killed.

She chooses to fight Kylo Ren, and beats him in her first lightsaber battle after closing her eyes and thinking about the Force.

She sort of chooses to go summon Luke back to civilization - I say sort of because it's not clear why she was picked to go over, say, Leia.

Luke makes mistakes, and he is an active participant in his story. Rey is just kind of there, most of the time. She doesn't make mistakes, but she doesn't really do much else.

Rey has no personal stake in this war or motivations and she’s supposed to be the main protagonist.

Rey has never left Jakku before TFA and she tells Han that ”she never knew so much green existed” when they go to Maz’s castle.

In other words Rey must have had very limited knowledge of the world outside of Jakku and all she has heard from it are stories.

Rey who barely knows anything about the rest of the galaxy, to the point that she didn’t even know that forests existed what exactly is her personal stake in the current galactic conflict?

In TFA we saw The New Republic’s capital systems blown up by Starkiller Base and we never saw a reaction from Rey. We do see Finn and Han’s reactions. Also worth noting about Rey is that if she was unconscious throughout her involuntary travel to the Starkiller Base she was never actually aware of the Starkiller Base until just before Han, Finn and Chewie started planting the explosions in order to sabotage it.

Luke, while he had no personal attachments to Aldeeran did actually get to see the horrible aftermaths of it’s destruction.

But Rey was barely affected by the destruction of the Capital systems. Most characters were not as affected as they should have been in my opinion but we didn’t even get to see her have an emotional reaction to it.

This was probably the greatest genocide in Star Wars history and our main heroine is unaffected by it? Finn has a reaction to it and he’s supposedly NOT the main protagonist?

Rey really has no reason to care about the state of the galaxy. She only seems to care if people she knows are in danger.

The fact that she is supposed to be our main hero of this trilogy when she has next to no personal stakes in the well-being of the rest of the galaxy feels wrong to me.

Finn actually has stakes in this conflict since the FO took his family and childhood away from him and Poe has stakes because he actually lives in the New Republic and doesn’t want it to be under FO’s rule. Yet neither Finn nor Poe are considered the main protagonist? But oh wait, I forgot we can’t have a black or Latino man be the leading protagonist in Star Wars

The more I think about it is Rey has no goals or agency as a protagonist. She’s just whatever the plot demands her to be. Rey doesn’t actively take the initiative and make decisions, and simply react to the world around her. There is never a reason given as to why she wants to be a Jedi. Sure, she’s heard the stories about them, but she doesn’t dream to be one like Anakin, and the writers are so obsessed over her parents that they never develop any other motivation besides that. She has to be strung along the story so she can take part in it, hence she is repeatedly chased and kidnapped throughout TFA to get her to the Resistance where she decides to find Luke because she has nowhere else to go. Part of the reason she doesn’t even train with Luke is because she has no reason to, as she’s just supposed to find him. Rey joins the fight simply in reaction to learning that Luke is responsible for Ben’s fall. She’s only ever a Jedi and a member of the Resistance out of necessity- she has no where left to go and has to fight in self defense- so they try hamfist in some motives that she needs to stop herself from becoming like Palpatine but there is no tension as it’s the final act. By the end of the trilogy it’s not even clear if the Jedi Order will return because Rey never seems to want to be one and we can only assume they will return for meta reasons- because the audience knows the ST is a copypasta of the OT.

What exactly was Rey’s motivation for getting involved in the Galactic conflict before TROS? Luke was told that his father was killed by Darth Vader and later his family gets murdered by the empire so he had personal stakes to get involved in the conflict.

Anakin was a Jedi and had lived in the Republic for ten years by the time of the Clone Wars begun so he had personal reasons to get involved in the conflict.

Rey meanwhile grew up so isolated of Jakku that she had no idea forests existed and she didn’t lose anything and the FO attacked her on Jakku. In fact she wanted to return to Jakku after she had dumped BB-8 with the Resistance. Her primary motivation in TFA was to reunite with her family but the movie never establish that her family’s absence was connected to the galactic conflict in any way.

That connection isn’t established until TROS so what was her motivation until than? The Death of Han? A guy she had known for two hours? Finn? A guy she also had maybe only knew for about two hours total by the time of their hug in TLJ? Also she seemed to have completely forgotten about Finn by the time she want on a quest to redeem the guy that has far as she should have known by that point was still in a coma with his spine permanently damaged because of Kylo.

Rey’s motivation seems to either be finding her family or her dealing with her existential crisis neither had much of a connection with the galactic conflict until TROS

[antianakin]

I'm not sure I'd agree that it was always that explicit that Jedi can "heal" using the Force. Since you said you haven't seen it, the context is that Rey stabs Kylo through the abdomen with a lightsaber, so he has a big obvious injury that we as the audience can see, and then she reaches out and heals that specific injury with the Force so that he doesn't die from it. The visible injury heals in front of our eyes within seconds.

In ANH, Luke is knocked out a little, sure, but he's not that injured, so his waking up could be entirely natural. Obi-Wan places a hand on his forehead, but Luke doesn't wake up immediately, so it could just as easily be like... a scan of some sort, sussing out how injured Luke actually is as opposed to literally healing him. You can see it either way, there's just not enough clarity to claim that Obi-Wan has definitely healed him from something in this scene. There's no discussion of Force healing in the Prequels at all to my memory, let alone that all Jedi have some kind of prowess in it. The healer we see in TCW seems to primarily be using regular healing techniques rather than magical Force techniques like what Rey does in TROS. The closest you get is Yoda being put into some kind of sensory deprivation tank, but the effects of it don't seem to be something the healer herself is doing.

And in ROTS, I don't think it's accurate to say that Anakin is worried because he knows he's weak at healing. My understanding is that he's convinced by Palpatine that there's some kind of SECRET ability that the Jedi are hiding from him that can stop death, which doesn't match up with the idea that he's asking for powers that already exist, but that he's just weaker in. I think he's worried because he KNOWS that even the Jedi skills he's aware of won't necessarily be able to stop death. If the Jedi healers could stop death, I feel like he'd have been doing some very different things in response to his vision of Padme. It's the knowledge that regular means CAN'T stop death that lead to him looking for irregular means. That feels like kind-of the whole point of the storyline to me, that Anakin wants to keep death from happening at all and the Jedi just don't believe in that kind of thing and the only way to even try to manage it is with the dark side.

So the reason that the healing in TROS feels kind-of crazy is because it's NOT the kind of thing that prior Star Wars stuff had ever shown and because "Force healing" as a magical ability was not a thing Star Wars had really included before. You can make some assumptions based on the lack of clarity in Obi-Wan's scene with Luke and the existence of Jedi healers, sure, but it's not like anybody in the main 6 films or in TCW discusses anything like what we saw in TROS or even just any kind of fantastical magic healing abilities. I think Force healing is really POPULAR in things like Legends and other fantasy stories and so a lot of fans just generally enjoy that concept. And now that we're getting a lot of Legends fans writing mainstream Star Wars, we're seeing things like Force healing make its way into them, too. Someone else pointed out that Grogu ALSO uses some kind of more explicit Force healing in Mando season 1 which would've aired almost exactly the same time as TROS came out in theaters, and Filoni, like Abrams, is a big fucking Legends fan. So something that wasn't really ever explicitly in Lucas's Star Wars is now being made a VERY explicit Force ability just because a lot of fans really like the concept, regardless of whether it actually makes sense or not.

I just saw this take in a collection of Star Wars videos I was watching and just…… what even:

where do people come up with stuff like this. Also I needn’t say it but this makes me so angry

This is what happens when fans try too hard to make something "make sense" in universe rather than accepting a meta/out-of-universe explanation for it.

So sure, if the ST introduces the idea that you can "Force heal" by learning it from some sort of Jedi text, it begs the question of why we never see any of the Prequels Jedi using it. Did they know about it and simply chose not to use it? Was it restricted to Jedi HEALERS for some reason? Did they NOT know about it because it was in a really obscure text that nobody even remembered anymore? And the ST chose not to answer any of those questions, which leaves the fans to try to come up with their own answers.

And the real answer is that the people who made the ST had no fucking idea what they were doing and quite honestly don't seem to have cared much about narrative continuity much at all. There's Force healing in the ST and not in any of the others because Force healing like what we see in the ST would kind-of ruin the entire POINT of the other stories. Luke could just... save Anakin. Anakin could just save Padme. Obi-Wan could just save Qui-Gon. Then where would the story be? Force healing is unsatisfying within the narratives we've been given and ruins the entire point of the message Lucas was sending with them.

But nobody who was making the Sequels fucking cared, so. Now we have Force healing from some random Jedi texts. Cool. Whatever. People who hate the Jedi are just going to hate the Jedi, they'll find whatever reason they want to do so, regardless of what the actual films show and regardless of what Lucas says. As someone who DOES like the Jedi, my explanation for why there's suddenly Force healing that can be learned from a text is that the people making the ST were fucking stupid and nobody realized or cared that it broke a lot of the narratives from the prior two trilogies and went against the themes of those films. That's it.

[johannestevans]

Weekly Update 28/02/2022

Good evening!

It's the end of February, coming into March, and I'm so excited for what I want to work on the next little while. Happy St David's Day for the 1st of March, if you celebrate, Cymru am byth!

The past week I've been playing Samurai Warriors 4, and to my delight it's even more homoerotic than Samurai Warriors 2 which I grew up with, with a lot more complexity to the characters and a lot of new characters and character angles too, so I'm really enjoying it. If you like that sort of hack-and-slash game, I definitely do recommend it, and I shall almost certainly be playing SW5 at some point.

I'm currently watching Halston, which is on Netflix and is a miniseries about the gay fashion designer, played by Ewan McGregor, which I definitely recommend if you want something a bit mindless to put on - it's trashy and it's fun, and while it's not very deep and doesn't do anything interesting with any of its characters, I've really been enjoying having it on in the background. Some other gems I've enjoyed this week are:

SHUDŌ (2015, dir. To-Anh Bach, Charles Badiller, and Hugo Weiss) - This is a short film, it's literally only a couple of minutes long, and it's about two samurai, once lovers, fighting to the death. Such a lot of emotion and heart packed into such a tiny little piece, and I can't recommend it enough.

The Wretched (2019, dir. Brett Pierce & Drew T. Pierce) - This is a teen horror flick that does some fun stuff with the conventions of monstrous witches, mind control, and some interesting character stuff. I really enjoyed the twist, and I really liked how real a lot of the characters feel - the protagonist in particular is flawed in ways I appreciated, and I liked that a lot.

They Live In The Grey (2022, dir. Abel Vang & Burlee Vang) - This is a new Shudder release, and I really liked it. It's quite slow-paced, so definitely put some time aside to really watch and digest it if you give it a go, but it did so much interesting work with trauma and the isolation of not being able to voice or verbalise that trauma, especially because you feel insecure about communicating it or don't know how to word it. I love what it does with ghosts and haunting, and all the dialogue and character interaction feels so real, to the point of being really quite painful.

The Silenced (2011, dir. Hwang Dong-hyuk) - This one is fucking heavy, but it's a drama based on real life, starring Gong Yoo as a teacher who comes to a school for Deaf children and uncovers several cases of CSA. It's primarily about the court case and the ways in which the process is unjust and corrupt, on top of being in various ways retraumatising for the victims - it's so well done, and Gong Yoo really does just. Nail the role, as is his wont.

Some other stuff from this week that I enjoyed were The Ice King, Nobody Knows I'm Here, District 9, Splinter, and The Hole.

New Works Published

Slice-of-life/Romance Short: Whisper to the Bees

A journalist goes out to do a small piece on everyday farmlife, and ends up meeting an old acquaintance from school.

4.3k, M/M, rated T. Just a light-hearted little window into two men’s lives, introducing Melodious King and Calumellus Renn. Please note warnings for self-harm, references to attempted suicide, mental illness including chronophobia, and bullying and homophobia.

On Patreon / / On Medium

Erotic Short: Warm Welcome Home

Jude comes home to his boyfriend, and is welcomed back with open legs.

2k, rated E, M/M. More Jude Jupp and Richard Chastain — featuring anal, dirty talk, teasing, kissing, and some mild D/s and fantasy around the housewife power dynamic.

Rich and Jude first appeared in Saint Jude's Kitchen.

On Patreon / / On Medium

Erotic Short: Two Artists

A watercolour artist who lives in a country village is faced with the young man who tried and failed at seducing him a decade back.

Just under 3k, cis M/M, rated E. Age difference, anal, orgasm denial, D/s, some pinning and manhandling, a lot of dirty talk, some begging. References made throughout to past fantasies as a teenager.

On Patreon / / On Medium

Serial Update: Rescue Dogs

Cecil and Valorous talk about their childhoods, and then they go on a hike.

Content warnings in this chapter include obsessive tendencies, paedophilia, child abuse, reference to CSA and sexual abuse, alcoholism, manipulation, self-harm, panic attacks, self-esteem issues, identity issues, some emotional numbness from Valorous’ POV, references to dog bites and infection, as well as references to child death.

On Medium / / On WorldAnvil

[teagrl]

Yay Burn Up My Heels is done. Oh no, Frangi why so many loose ends aaaaaarghhh.

Zombie author here will provide some notes on my ending, but as always the fic stands or doesn’t by itself. Whoever reads is the final arbiter. The fic is posted! I, as the author, am DEAD.

So leaving loose ends is my MO and I've stopped apologizing for it. I bind my stories thematically which means they don't necessarily have closed endings. But they do conclude the specific plot in motion. Burn's A-plot was always bringing the lightsaber back, it's B-plot was Mara's coming of age -- told as a romance (as much as Stone’s was a coming of age told as a captivity narrative, and Citadel was a straight-up gothic, I have written about coming of age here and here). She gets on a path to self actualization through discovering her affinity with someone who, on paper, is nothing like her (by virtue of being a colonial streetwalker etc). Ultimately, her abandonment issues come to play making it so she chooses loyalty above herself, but she returns to the Empire with a goal of making things better which of course blows up in her face. The end for Mara is her worst nightmare come to pass being cut loose from her master, the Empire, being tarred as a criminal, tortured and slated for execution. Oh nooooo.

Have we forgotten that the Empire is a piece of shit? That Mara ultimately doesn't mean anything to the Emperor? He doesn't even set out to hurt her in how I think of the final events, he just point blank doesn't give a shit and lets ISB have their way with her. It's very cruel, but this gets her out of the Empire pretty quick in her tenure (she's 18-19 tops), a good three-four years before canon.

Now what's going on with Luke? The key to that is actually in the dialog our pov imperial overhears:

"It's not really bounty hunting. More like being in the know. It's like that thing the small-time organizations do now," the ensign was saying, loud enough for Ventfor to hear several paces away. "Say Black Sun wants Crymorah middle management out of their hair. But the Crymorah know, they've been enemies for a long time, so there's no element of surprise, right? That's where the little guys come in—unaffiliated small-timers. No one knows them, so they keep their head down, keep their ears open. One day they surprise the vigo, grab him for the big timers. They don't kill him, though. They comm it in -- for a price."

[...]

"They make sure the vigo is easy prey. They cripple him," the ensign continued. "Leave him limping in a dark alley or something," he laughed. "Big-timers want the bastard dead, right? They want to send a message, want the bragging rights for the kill shot, the turf, what's in his pockets -- but without the risk of the other guy getting the drop on them. So these small-time players, they eat the risk without the bragging rights, without the fame. It's not direct, see? They're not the ones pulling the trigger. That's one of the ways they keep a low profile, make their credits, and get those who know not to fuck with--"

Sub in Black Sun and Crymorah for the Empire and Son-Tuul and that describes what Luke’s group is going. They crippled the Star Destroyer then called it in so the Son Tuul could get their payback (Mara mentions Vader destroyed the Son Tuul’s HQ in the transcript that opens the chapter, this is a comics easter egg) .

And if oh any of this sounds like information brokering with a kick (lol literally?), then that’s kind of funny, no?

In Ch 30 Luke had seemed quite interested in the fact that Force users could find locations (Mara finding the Hand of Judgement is in Choices of One):

“I don’t know. They just disappeared. Last time I worked with [LaRone and his men] I had to use the Force to find them --”

He leaned forward slightly, expression shifting to curiosity but no less intense. “Wait. Using the Force? Like the -- the healing? How?”

She waved a hand. “It’s hard to explain, you just kind of focus on what you want to find -- anyway, I tried to look into ISB -- the Imperial Security Bureau to see where I could lodge an appeal on their behalf, but I didn't get too far.”

It’s been six months since this. Luke’s obviously kept very very busy and there’s been a lot of Force-ish stuff going on between the lines among both of them (in VotF it’s mentioned how Luke and Mara were always kind of sensible to each other --that regardless of the bond they had been in tune sort of, this fic takes up that idea on the dl. As they grow closer Mara feels what Luke feels more strongly, by the end she has his nightmare). Is he a Jedi like the Imperials are freaking out about? Did they witness some Mandalorian-style hallway throwdown? LOL NO. But they did see that lightsaber batting bolts and hacking down people left and right, which is sufficient to raise the alarm and have them send the footage to Coruscant. So oooh what does this meaaaaan-- safe to say Luke and Mara won’t be under the radar for that long.

Why the stylistic change?

I decided to do a transcript because I felt a full-on interrogation from Mara’s pov was unnecessary. I tend to think these kinds of scenes are kind of gratuitous when written blow by blow. In Ricochet, I showed the beginning of one and then cut. Here I liked the depersonalizing effect of having the transcript erase her name and communicating the interviewer’s contempt through tone as well as Mara’s own state through the way her speech becomes more fragmented before she tries to marshal herself together to voice the injustice of what she’s being put through (as best she can in her situation).

As for the Imperial pov, as I mentioned in a comment, canon is SATURATED with breakout scenes. I based this one heavily on ANH, DFR, and Lords of the Sith (though that one wasn’t a breakout as much as a break in). To do something a little different, I thought Imperial pov could give me some interesting beats. I love ending with a female voice on the comm making a kind of sexualized threat (“You’re looking a little...lonely. Maybe we can help”) that ties into the thematics of the fic at large. Why yes, my faves were very, very lonely and while hardly getting a hearts and flowers ending, they’re certainly not lonely now, which is my conclusion to the B-plot.

B-plot-wise I’m back in my own terrain. For several years now I’ve been writing about a girl, her imperial conditioning, and the boy who adamantly refuses to give up on her. I still think it’s a compelling story to tell. Thank you thank you thank you again to all who have joined me!

[rise-above-the-grave]

Leia’s response to her trauma?

Oh boy, where do I even start with this?

PLEASE NOTE: These are my headcanons, and my take on things. These are only a little bit supported by canon (though they aren’t denied by canon either). Please feel free to ignore my takes on this particular subject!!

tw: suicidal ideation/tendencies, self harm, eating disorder, rape mention, torture mention

Suicidality

Leia is passively suicidal until she’s at least 25. This does not mean she is actively trying to kill herself, with maybe one or two exceptions, but rather that she walks into dangerous (and yes, often deadly) situations with the thought “Maybe I’ll die this time,” rather than the (much healthier) “Hopefully I won’t die this time.” She really just doesn’t care if she dies - in fact, she sort of hopes she does, though she won’t do anything (again, with the exception of one or two times) to incite her own death. She holds too much responsibility on her shoulders, knows that she is too important and too needed, understands that her death would truly cripple the Rebellion, to actually act on her desire to die.

That doesn’t keep her from wanting to die, though.

And yes, there is one (or maybe two) time(s) when she almost actively kills herself. Han stops her once, and Luke stops her the second time (if the second time happens - I haven’t actually decided if that does or not?).

Self harm

Okay, I’ll be honest here: I don’t think Leia does the “typical” forms of physical self-harm, e.g. cutting, burning, etc. Nothing that leaves physical scars on her body, or marks that someone could theoretically see and question. She emotionally self-harms more than anything (e.g. looking at holos of Alderaan, of her parents, looking for people who blame her for Alderaan’s destruction, getting into nasty arguments with people about that, etc.), though she also has the tendency to punish herself physically really harshly on Bad Nights by pushing her body past its edge of endurance. This leads to torn muscles, stress fractures, etc., but they’re all things that are easy enough to dismiss as an “accident” because she “doesn’t know what she’s doing” or whatever. (Those who know her well enough know that she has to purposefully be doing this, because she knows better than to exercise that hard on cold muscles, etc. - but it’s never anything anyone can prove, and she’s usually alone in the gym when she does this, and she never like...does anything to purposefully hurt herself, she’s just negligent and stupid. Regardless of what anyone suspects, though, it’s never anything they can prove.)

Eating disorder

Yeah, so, I’m pretty sure Leia could technically be diagnosed with an ED post-Alderaan. She just straight up doesn’t eat afterwards until she absolutely has to, and when she does, if she eats “too much”, she throws up. She loses a shit ton of weight between ANH and ESB (and it’s not like she had a lot to lose to begin with, because she’s smol and also was already in really good shape), and this does’t start getting better until Hoth, when people start realizing how malnourished she is because she’s constantly shivering. (She’ll drink protein shakes and stuff to keep herself in shape and capable of hard exercise, but like...she’s unhealthily skinny...) She doesn’t necessarily count calories, but she severely restricts, and then her body purges if she eats more than a little bit at a time.

Nightmares

Leia has horrific nightmares. They vary from night to night, though they have consistent themes: Alderaan’s destruction, people she loves dying/disappearing/being taken away from her, watching people she loves be tortured or killed in front of her, being hurt (including both torture and rape, which I believe both happened on the Death Star). Most of her nightmares are abstractions of her trauma, with the exception of Alderaan’s destruction - i.e. she has nightmares about what happened through different scenarios that might mirror what Actually Happened, but aren’t necessarily a 1:1 reproduction.

Dissociation

So I think she dissociates more post-Bespin than post-Death Star, frankly, though she still dissociates post-Death Star. Post-Death Star it manifests more along the lines of “I’m still being tortured by Darth Vader, none of this is real, this is all a hallucination” than anything, with a dash of out of body experiences/seeing herself from third person; post-Bespin we start seeing a strong disconnect from reality at times, disconnection from her body, etc, as well as seeing herself in third person and disbelieving that what’s happening is Real.

“Responsibility”

Leia absolutely throws herself into her work. She uses it as a distraction and as a shield against her pain. She ignores basically everything in lieu of doing her Duty and fulfilling her Responsibilities. She uses this as armor against anyone who tries to challenge her to take care of herself as well (including Luke and Han). This is largely also what leads some people (in the Rebellion especially) to call her Ice Princess after Alderaan, because she just straight up doesn’t show emotion, and instead just focuses on the Rebellion. Which, speaking of...

Emotional regulation

Yeah, so I’m gonna go out there and say that Leia has shit emotional regulation for a while post-Death Star/Alderaan. She feels everything incredibly and intensely, and she just doesn’t know how to handle it. So she shuts down completely, or else overreacts. This is partly why she and Han end up in screaming matches in the base hallways so much, and why, once they actually start working out their feelings for one another (and Leia starts processing emotions healthily again), that stops.

Irritability

Leia is incredibly irritable and angry like. all the time. Constantly. There’s hardly any reprieve from it. Even when she’s happy, something small can set her off. (Again, this is partly what leads to her and Han fighting so much - because Han consistently gave her an outlet for her anger. Probably purposefully. Really the only one Leia rarely got angry with was Luke, and when she did get mad at him, she’d usually apologize for blowing up at him.)

Flashbacks

Yeah, Leia definitely has flashbacks: to Alderaan’s destruction, to Vader’s hand on her shoulder holding her back from Tarkin as Alderaan died, to the needles, to the torture-bot, to the hallucinations Vader gave her as he dug through her brain, to Vader himself, to metal beds and cells, to the smell of bile and antiseptic, to the feel of soft cloth against her skin, to the feel of metal against her skin, to the sensation of grates against her skin. Sometimes those flashbacks are just behind her eyes, like she sees them but knows they’re not real; sometimes she literally cannot tell she is not lying in the cell on the Death Star with Vader towering over her, or watching Alderaan explode.

Triggers

Leia doesn’t like needles. Leia doesn’t like Vader. Leia doesn’t like the smell of medbays. Leia doesn’t like a lot of things. Anyway, Leia deffo has triggers. That doesn’t always mean she has flashbacks (emotional or visual or auditory or psychosomatic), though; sometimes she just gets really, irrationally angry, sometimes she snaps, sometimes she goes nonverbal (I’m pretty sure Leia goes nonverbal sometimes post-Death Star/Alderaan. It’s unfortunate), sometimes she just seems to lose her damn mind. She’ll also sometimes get really manic after being triggered.

Hyper-arousal 

Leia is...so tense. All the time. She is constantly aware of everything going on around her. She’s one of those people who knows every entrance/exit, how many people are in a room, how close the nearest person is to her, etc. She also sometimes jumps at loud noises, reacts violently to people touching her unexpectedly, and to people coming up behind her. She is Not A Fan of that shit.

tl;dr Did I just describe most of the DSM criteria for PTSD? Yes! Yes I did!! Leia has really pretty bad PTSD post-Death Star/Alderaan, including the ugly and horrible bits that most people don’t like to talk about! It really fucked her up! And she’s one of the ones who got angry and bitter and hard instead of soft and scared. And there’s nothing wrong with that!