#I can make them bail at whatever point kills me the most and then we can set them up with a nice little redemption arc

[sparingiscaring]

Girl (Gender Neutral) Help I gave my throwaway Seeker OC a Tragic Backstory and now I'm attached

[decolonize-the-everything]

Im an american and I'm so scared of the future. I think I'm gonna die under a trump presidency and I don't what to do.

There are people dying under Biden now and with the supreme court decision to criminalize homeless people I suspect that there will soon be more.

That to say, solidarity will be our salvation in the face of fascists trying to divide us with fear and attacks on our rights. Yeah it is terrifying, but there are more oppressed people than there are oppressors. There is a reason they are attacking our communities one at a time, fear mongering, and trying to make us choose a side all at the same time.

What you need to do is the scary thing and put your trust in activists and leftists who are desperately shouting from the rooftops that the most important thing we can do right now is put our foot down and disengage from a corrupt two party system that only uplifts white supremacist fascists.

We have an awful government because we allow awful people in our government. Point blank. There is no getting around that or making excuses for it anymore. That led us here, right?

Whatever happens, no matter how this election goes the next 4 years are going to be impossible to describe in how bad it will be for people across the planet and the planet itself.

Honestly? You should be scared. Only fascists wouldnt be. But, if you're able to do something about it then let that fear turn into rage and become your fire.

Get mad at the people who put you in this impossible position. Because they knew better and they didn't care about your life or the millions of others at risk everyday! Why the hell should any of us keep playing into a system where our own president (and plenty of other politicians throughout time) can say we should die for the economy, for this country, for them when they wont let us walk down the street holding hands with our trans partner, when they kill our communities for jogging while Black, when they wont even let us live in poverty without sending us to prison!! People work themselves to the bone in this country to get by and you're telling me they'll never own or deserve a home? That even at the end of serving a long war, one of the most patriotic and respectable things you can do for an imperialist country, a veteran's kindest statistic to come home to is still an early death?

Fuck that.

Shits fucked. It's been fucked for a long time. If you're fine now you'll probably be fine under Trump if we're being honest.

But if that chance you won't be keeps you up at night, know that you aren't alone. That fear in your heart, that pit in your stomach is something every oppressed person has in common and it will be what unites us.

Like I said. Let it turn to rage, to fire. A single candle is no big deal to put out, but could they stop a wildfire so easily?

You're not going to die under Trump.

There are too many of us being wronged by the same exact systems. And as long as we focus on that and build on that instead of arguing over which system leader the worst, then we'll be fine. The point is they all suck, right? So find common ground there instead of discourse.

Solidarity can look like:

Donating! to bail funds, Palestinian escape gfms, human rights orgs, grassroots activists circles, directly to marginalized people, etc.

Not advocating for the two party system/voting blue

Remembering that equality will not be gained by stepping on someone else- no more compromising the needs of others. If one person says something hurts then their pain can't be part of any solution to someone else's problem.

On that note: listening when PoC and esp Black women tell you when something is racist, harmful, or oppressive. Listen when you are told that the solution you are considering will still leave people marginalized, isn't accessible, and/or isn't inclusive enough.

Solidarity also looks like not taking it personally when you are told that the action/opinion you just voiced was hurtful or ignorant or even bigoted. You DO have misinformed opinions and beliefs and you WILL be checked on those when they occur (just like you check others probably.) No, not everyone will be nice about it and you shouldn't let that discourage you! You should remember that being checked is exactly what everyone is gonna have to get used to. That is what building a better future is gonna look and feel like for everyone at some point. Everyone is ignorant about something. Just learn to say thank you when you're educated for free.

Get used to discomfort!! A little discomfort now is going to be worth the human rights and solidarity and justice we have later. Solidarity is gonna look like Not constantly centering your own comfort or lifestyle or privileges. It's gonna look like reading the room and knowing what a tone deaf comment/request is and when your silence is more appropriate (This is how you will earn trust in community spaces that've become hypervigilant of bad faith allies)

You figure out what your community needs and seek to provide it through either donations, working with local orgs, labor, awareness, (ex: donating/making meals, cleaning, providing clothes or birth control, sharing MutAid requests, boosting activist groups, etc), and showing up to support your community's movements and protests.

Even my tiny rural area has queer meetups, anarchist bookclubs, and a Mexican activist group with a Facebook page; get involved in your community in the ways you can. Learn the names of the people you'll be standing shoulder to shoulder with when Trump supporters start rallying against us all.

The fascist wave can be stopped but none of us will be able to do it alone. You aren't going to die under Trump because none of us are going to let that happen.

The same way you wouldn't let it happen to any of us.

The community that keeps you safe is the one you build.

[kabu-writes]

Incorrect quotes but with genshin characters

Diluc,Kaeya,Venti

diluc: In my defense, I was left unsupervised. kaeya: Wasn't venti with you? venti: In my defense, I was also left unsupervised.

diluc: kaeya and I were crossing the street, and this dude drove by and honked at us venti: *Sighing* What did kaeya do? diluc: They chased him to the next red light, then reached into his window and... kaeya: Who wants a steering wheel?

diluc: We need a distraction. kaeya: Is anyone here good at jumping up and down and making weird noises? venti, whispering: My time has come

diluc, holding a python: Guys I impulsively bought a snake, what do I name him kaeya: You did WHAT– venti: William Snakepeare

diluc: Please bring home PURIFIED water with NO minerals added for taste kaeya: We got spring water diluc: NO. venti: with EXTRA minerals kaeya: it's like licking a stalagmite diluc: DON'T COME HOME. venti: Mmmmm cave water

Jean, Lisa

jean: What are your goals? lisa: To pet all the dogs. jean: No, fitness goals. lisa: To be able to run fast enough to pet all the dogs.

jean: I am not out of control! I'm a law abiding citizen! lisa: Really? Name one law jean: Don't kill people? lisa: That's on me. I set the bar too low.

jean: Okay, help me please! lisa: Got two words for you. jean: I bet they won't be helpful. lisa: Your problem. jean: I was right

jean, struggling to keep upright in their 1 inch heels: Yeah, I-I don’t really think heels are for me lisa, pointing at them and walking flawlessly in sparkly golden 6 inch heels: WEAK.

jean: You're the love of my life and my best friend, I would do anything for you. lisa: I want you to eat three meals a day and have a decent sleep schedule. jean: Absolutely not.

Raiden Shogun, Yae Miko

Raiden Shogun: You know, not every problem can be solved with a sword. Yae Miko: That's why I carry two swords.

Raiden Shogun: Do you have any skeletons in your closet? Yae Miko: You mean literally or figuratively? Raiden Shogun: Honestly, the fact that I have to specify...

Raiden Shogun: That’s one of my biggest fears. Like, if I ever woke up as a donut... Yae Miko: You would eat yourself? Raiden Shogun: I wouldn’t even question it.

Raiden Shogun: What if the 'g' in 'gif' is silent? Yae Miko: Go the fuck to sleep Raiden Shogun: What gif I don't want to? Yae Miko: Fuck You

Raiden Shogun: Sorry it took me so long to bail you out of jail Yae Miko: No it’s my fault, I shouldn’t’ve used my one phone call to prank call the police

Itto, Gorou, Ayato, Thoma

Itto: On the count of three, what's your favorite cake? One, two, three- Itto and Gorou, in unison: Chocolate cake peanut butter frosting with chocolate chunks! Ayato: Our turn, Thoma! One, two, three- vanilla! Thoma, deadpan: I've never had cake, what is cake.

Itto: *Trying to fill out legal paperwork stuff* Were you guys born AMAB or AFAB? Gorou: Bold of you to assume I was born at all. Ayato: I personally was created in a lab. Thoma: I just straight up spawned lol.

Itto: *Screams* Gorou: *Screams louder to establish dominance* Ayato: Should we do something? Thoma: No, I want to see who wins.

Itto: You are now one day closer to eating your next plate of nachos. Gorou: That's the most hopeful thing I've ever heard. Ayato: But what if I die tomorrow and never eat any nachos? Thoma: Then tomorrow is nacho lucky day.

Cop: You’re receiving a ticket for having three people on one motorcycle. Itto: Shit. Gorou: Wait, three? Cop: Yeah? Ayato: OH MY GOD THOMA FELL OFF!!!

Tighnari, Cyno

Tighnari: Today is a day of running through hurdles. Cyno: Aren’t you supposed to jump OVER hurdles? Tighnari: Whatever. Fear is only something to be afraid of if you let it scare you.

Tighnari, tending to Cyno's wounds: How would you rate your pain? Cyno: Zero stars. Would NOT recommend.

Tighnari: i went through an entire character arc during quarantine Tighnari: i became more evil if you’re curious Cyno: We're still in quarantine, don't worry, there's time for a redemption arc still! Tighnari: i’m going to get worse on purpose

Tighnari, in a meeting: My policy is if you see something, say something. Cyno: I saw a squirrel in a tree today! Tighnari, with the tone of someone who is used to Cyno: Outstanding. Tighnari: This is what I’m talking about people.

Tighnari: *Kicks the door down looking panicked* Cyno: What did you do? Tighnari: Nobody died. Cyno: WHAT KIND OF ANSWER IS THAT?!

Tartaglia/Childe, Zhongli

Tartaglia: English is a difficult language. It can be understood through tough thorough thought, though. Zhongli: You need to stop.

Tartaglia: Where are you going? Zhongli: To get ice cream or commit a felony, I’ll decide on the way there

Tartaglia: *Walking in to a room* Sorry I’m late... I was... doing things. *Sounds of running footsteps progressively getting louder* Zhongli: *Out of breath* THEY PUSHED ME DOWN THE FUCKIN’ STAIRS.

Tartaglia: I'm 10 times funnier and sexier than you Zhongli: 10 times 0 is still 0 though Tartaglia: Jokes on you, I can't do math

Tartaglia: Whaddya call a fish with no eye? Zhongli, not looking up: Myxine Circifrons Tartaglia: Tartaglia: fsh

Ningguang, Beidou

*Ningguang and Beidou are doing something absurdly dangerous* Ningguang: I think Houdini did something like this once! Why, if I recall correctly, he was out of the hospital in no time! Beidou, deadpan: Well that's encouraging.

Ningguang, talking to Beidou on the phone: Did you preheat the oven like I told you to? Beidou: You bet! Ningguang: At what temperature? Beidou: 535. Ningguang: That's the clock. Beidou: Ningguang: Beidou: 536.

Ningguang: Beidou, stop! This isn't you, you've gone mad with power! Beidou: Well of course I have. Beidou: Have you ever tried going mad without power? Beidou: It's boring.

Ningguang: If there's going to be a big dramatic scene, wait until I get back. Beidou: Of course. I can't flip this table by myself.

Ningguang: What’s up guys? I’m back. Beidou: What the- you can’t be here. You’re dead. I literally saw you die. Ningguang: Death is a social construct.

Keqing, Ganyu

Keqing: Are you an ‘arr’ pirate, or a ‘yo ho ho’ pirate? Ganyu: I’m a ‘I’m not paying $600 for photoshop’ pirate.

Keqing: Let’s watch Sharkboy and Lavagirl. Ganyu: Okay. Keqing: And make out during the scary parts. Ganyu: Th- Ganyu: The scary parts. Ganyu: Of Sharkboy and Lavagirl.

Keqing: Am I in trouble? Ganyu: Take a guess. Keqing: No? Ganyu: Take another guess.

Keqing: Name a more iconic duo than my crippling fear of abandonment and my anxiety. I'll wait. Ganyu: You and me!!! Keqing, tearing up: Okay.

Keqing, trying to cheer the group up: Things could be worse, you know! Ganyu: How? Keqing: How what? Ganyu: How could they be worse? Keqing: They couldn’t, I lied. Ganyu:

Give me more groups/duos and ill post another <3 (this took far to long)

[drosselmeyerwrites]

Yashahime is problematic. No, you can't argue otherwise without exposing toxic traits you need to deal with. Here's why:

There's a lot of issues with Yashahime, many of which have been the subject of much debate over the last two years. Typically, the focus is on Sesshoumaru and Rin's relationship. While this pairing/ ship is undoubtedly problematic for reasons that many have already thoroughly explored, I want to talk about one problem in Yashahime (YH) that is not being talked about loudly enough that is not a debatable issue: neglectful parenting.

I will keep this as short as possible because the matter really is simple, and regardless of any justifications YH fans and S*ssr*n shippers may throw at the matter, there is no excuse. Such actions would just be further confirming the blatant willingness to make excuses for issues that exist in morally black and white territory that this side of the fandom unfortunately already champions.

In YH, Sesshoumaru, under the claim of trying to make them stronger, chooses to abandon his daughters. Don't come spewing crap about other adults being there to watch over them as they grew; it doesn't change the fact that Sesshoumaru - who is arguably more capable than any other in seeing to their training and protection - bailed. And continuing in the theme of negligence and abandonment, he allows his daughters to both suffer unnecessarily and die when it is something that he could have prevented.

I don't even know where to start with Rin. As a parent, Sesshoumaru's choices and actions are unconscionable. But then we see Rin express humor/ joy/ or whatever inappropriately placed cheerful crazy was going through her head as she tells Towa and Setsuna that they'll be persecuted just for being their father's daughters. It's mind blowing. And as the linked Tweet below shows (thanks, @mythicamagic!), it is a wildly stark difference from how a parent valued her hanyou child in the OG series. (More written below the picture.)

I'm sure people will speculate on why Rin reacted as such and also try to justify why she did - which is ridiculous and indicative of much deeper personal issues if one cannot call problems out and instead clings biases to the point of advocating for the detriment and harm of others.

But Sesshoumaru and Rin in YH, no matter their reasoning, are shit parents.

It is never the job of a parent to risk their children being harmed, traumatized, hurt (all of which we do see the girls struggling with as the series ends), or killed. It is never justifiable for a parent to allow for an put a child in the position of suffering all of the above. And that's what bothers me most about YH. This is exactly what Sesshoumaru does and Rin does absolutely nothing about (we can talk about how much this parallels women who choose an abusive relationship over their children's well-being another time - note, this is not criticizing women who are truly stuck and need help getting out but cannot.)

Don't come in here trying to throw the "It was another time," "It's fiction," and all that other crap. Being another time period doesn't negate that the actions are still harmful, and being fiction doesn't give fans the excuse to justify toxic and harmful behaviors and choices.

Sesshoumaru and Rin are problematic. But Yashahime is problematic because it takes every toxic and harmful thing they did as parents and tries to spin it as justifiable or right for the circumstances when there truly is no excuse for it.

Inuyasha proved that. His mother was around as long as she could be and didn't abandon him, and whether or not Inuyasha's your favorite, there's zero debate about him being strong and someone people don't want to screw with.

Sesshoumaru had a choice. Rin had a choice too (pity the man who takes newborns out of their mother's arm's and drops them in a forest...if Jaken or anyone else was there to see to their safety, could've been good ol' Sessh). And when Rin is finally out of that tree? Rin 100% had the ability to get into it with Sesshoumaru for his stupid-ass decisions and tell him to get said arse into gear and stop putting their girls through shit. She bears blame for allowing it to continue as well.

No matter how you feel about the show, there is nothing salvageable or justifiable about Sesshoumaru and Rin's parenting choices. It is neglect, and it is abandonment, and child protective services would have a heyday with the both of them.

And if you're still trying to justify this crap? Time to do some soul searching. And I hope to God if you're a parent you don't take the same stance in justifying harm to your own children. Setsuna and Towa are victims of neglectful and poor parenting, and YH tries to tell this story in a way that is family-friendly and celebrated.

Stop making excuses for harm, even if it's fictional.

The only thing left to say is what the fuck is wrong with people that this is even a thing?

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk. Pedo-apologists, child abuse apologists, and assholes in general finding their way to the comments will be immediately blocked.

[guccigarantine]

Michael Woe.Begone is the most character of all time and I refuse to shut up about him so please enjoy 4 minutes of everyone’s favorite time traveling cowboy 

Transcript: 

Mike: Anne found some settings that suggested that “excess travelers” as we had been calling them could be “consolidated”. I was skeptical. I couldn’t imagine a scientific mechanism through which that was possible. Once it happened you defacto had two different people with two different minds. I knew first hand how different, how disagreeable and incoherent those minds could be. One of mine was a fucking cowboy.

[Honk from episode 73 begins playing] 

“Hey Mikey, nice to meet you. Name’s Michael, around here they call Mikael.”

“Well, Mikey boy good news is big dog Mike Walters here to bail you out.”

“I’m too damn old for people to call me Mikey. I’m leaning into this whole grizzled old man thing.”

“Well, I don’t wanna get blood on my clothes and, uh you’re the worst dressed here so I think it should be you.”

“Enunciate my boot up your ass how’s that for grizzled old man talk?”

“’Cuz I’m smooth as butter partner.”

“You see her face when I tipped my hat? She got a kick out of it.”

“Damn straight partner.”

“I’ll have you know I’m the fastest gunslinger in this whole car.”

“I understand Cthulhu he’s literally just a guy chilling.”

“I’m just a cowboy with a heart of gold.”

“Surprise buckaroo it was me all along.”

“Gimme my hat back you ungrateful, green horned, son of a—“ [STATIC]

“Ornery is what he is. Ornery, what a word. Ornery. Ornery.”

“We kill people all the time and normally it’s just ‘cause someone told us to and we don’t even get to eat those people.”

“It’s a dummy LinkedIn page. Did you think I had a real LinkedIn page? What would I put on it?”

“Those were tactical cheese burgers.”

“Yep, he’s touching my bumper!”

“Hey! Wake up fuckass!” [SMACK] 

“I’m a goddamn cowboy.”

“Get your finest hostage taking attire on pilgrim.”

“It’ll be fine… or we’ll die. I think it’s about fifty fifty.”

“Eyes on the prize Mikey-bear. 

“The end with the hole in it is the one you point at the other guy.”

“You know you’re a lot easier to stuff into a car dead.”

“Mike, I know you’re a scared little puppy-dog in an unforgiving world but just take his phone, okay? I need you to do this for me it’s not weird until you make it weird.”

“Ahoy matey. If it isn’t the scurvy cur, Mike Walters.” 

“We are in the Gulf of Alaska. You’ll never guess what ocean that’s in.”

“It’s high noon, pilgrim.”

“Get in dipshit, we’re going for a ride!”

“And if I’m not back by then you can assume that I got enticed by a merman.”

“Look all the way out there and then out there too— every direction. See all the favor you did us.”

“Hang onto your hat partner!”

“I should join the rodeo.” 

“Shame I don’t got my hat. Hope he can still tell that I’m a cowboy.”

“Did I leave the oven on? Whatever.”

“Darn tootin.”

“Bruno! [Snaps] Сидеть! Хорош! Хорош, Bruno!”

“Turns out waking up to your upper half being separated from your lower half by some drywall ain’t pleasant.”

“Darn tootin.”

“I’d take you lot yelling over Mike’s baby voice he keeps doing for the dog.”

“Howdy, Mikey.”

“Hey, you little snitch.”

“Quit yelling over each other, you’re scaring Bruno. Sorry Bruno. Сидеть.”

“Shuffle the deck better next time dipshit.”

“Mike, I swear if you don’t throw that ball for him you and Bruno are going missing too.”

“Yes, sir Mr. Walters! I’ll be a good boy.”

“I bought him a whole chicken just for him.”

“Anyway, I love that movie, Grizzly Adams. It’s really gay.”

“Must of got you two mixed up then huh? Guess I’m lyin’ then.”

“I would be rubbin’ it in.”

“Shit! Shit! What time is it?”

“Was they close? Apologies Charlie, he don’t know everything I do.”

“I fucked up!”

“We killed him,” Michael said. “Mikey, we’re trying to recruit her we can’t pussyfoot around.”

“10-4 good buddy.”

“The Cowboy Iteration, if you will.”

“Get it together quick Mike I done fucked up.”

“Be seein’ y’all,” Michael tipped his hat. 

[Music fades out]

Michael: Do you think that he thought that was my actual voice?”

Mike: Maybe not at the very end, but for almost the whole time, yeah I think he did! 

[frontmansbitch]

Front man with serial killer reader that he bailed out of jail?

Fuck Respect (Front Man x Serial Killer!Reader)

♡ Synopsis || The games need an extra spice to keep things more entertaining. The Front Man has been tasked to settle an agreement with the one that has been found to be the most competent for this role, even if it means they are a notorious serial killer who is known to play by their own rules.

♡ Content warnings || Handcuffed, teasing, switching power dynamics, fingering, edging, basically hate fucking but there’s more hate than actual fucking

♡ Author’s note || Ooo, love how different this is, I like it! Unfortunately, that only makes it equally as hard to meet expectations. Most people want the porn instead of the plot, but there's more dialogue here than action, sorry. I am also a bit worried that I went too off-topic and OOC, the reader here is more of a brat than a serial killer. I hope this is still satisfactory for you and enjoyable for everyone else to read though!

+ The Reader does not have a specified gender or sex in this! They can be whatever you want them to be.

Just when you thought you got your ticket to freedom, you wake up in another prison. The last thing you remember was some men wearing hot pink taking you out of jail. Now, you are locked in a room with your dominant hand cuffed onto the chair you were placed on, trying to regain your senses.

“You are up,” a deep voice, almost mechanical, broke the silence.

“Who are you? Where am I?” voices echoed as you spoke at the dark figure in front of you.

“I am here to make a deal,” the dark blur continued. “We have observed your capabilities and have concluded that you would be a suitable asset for us.” It wasn’t long after until your vision cleared up, and you could see the person talking to you. He sat directly on the opposite side of you, looking inscrutable. Never mind, he wore an expressionless mask that covered his entire face.

“Tch, and I thought cheap Halloween masks were my thing.”

"We have heard about the machinery you can produce, and like them to be a valuable addition to our annual games."

"Games?" you question. "You brought me here to make some party games for you?"

"These games are different, and quite possibly may be of your liking," he said.

Ah, you get it now. "So you want me to help you create a killing game?" This definitely wasn't the first time someone asked you to build stuff for them. "What's in it for me?"

"We can guarantee your freedom and safety," the guy in black continued. He opened a large briefcase in front of him. "And we will also give you this."

Piles of money were stashed neatly inside. There was no doubt that there was at least ten million won in there, no, even more maybe. You’ll admit it, there was a lot, but it’s not anything new to you.

“I don’t need my freedom and safety to be in your hands,” you scoff. “And money means no shit to me”

“We understand that you are an independent individual, and have expected your reluctance,” he answered. “We still had hope that we could convince you to join. Trust us, we can all help each other.”

“Who the fuck is ‘we’?” you exclaimed. “I don’t even know who you are, how am I supposed to know about every other person you are referring to? Why the fuck should I trust you?”

“You are Y/N, an infamous serial killer who used advanced technology to eliminate your victims and discarded them in unique ways. Your years of murder were finally put to an end when you were caught in October 2007,” he said. “I am the Front Man here. The point of our organisation is to allow everyone an opportunity to redeem themselves here.”

“Well, looks like you have done your research,” you acknowledge. “Firstly, I don’t see myself as just a serial killer. I like to call myself more of an artist.” You slightly lean closer. “Secondly, if you know me so well, why did you leave one of my hands uncuffed? I can easily pick one of these,” a grin widened on your face, “aren’t you afraid I can kill you right here if I wanted to?”

“I know how foolish this may be, but this was to prove that we trust you,” he reached into his pocket and revealed a gun. “If you don’t cooperate, I can kill you right here if I wanted to as well.”

“Bullshit.” Your grin slightly grew. “If you trusted me, you wouldn’t keep using the term ‘we’. You are nothing but a minion, aren’t you?”

“I cannot disclose any information about the Host if that’s what you are implying.”

“I’m just saying, why should I accept your offer if you can’t do one simple thing of trusting me? Come here then, prove to me that you trust me as much as you trust your boss’s orders.”

“You have to promise to stay.”

“Sheesh, you must be obsessed with me if you need me that badly. Come on then, I will stay if you prove you actually have faith in me.”

Slowly, he followed your orders and crept closer to you. “Still so hesitant. Put the gun down, and come down here.”

The Front Man put his gun down, away from where he could reach. He kneeled down closer to you until you could see a little shine in his eyes behind the mask. The realisation of the power you now had soiled your brain. There was so much you can do now with your captor vulnerable like this, you decide you should take this opportunity to have some fun.

"You can see my face, show me yours now," you say as you slip your uncuffed hand underneath his hoodie, brushing his hair.

The Front Man grabs your wrist and pushes it aside. "I have already shown you my trust, now keep your end of the deal and join us."

"Did I say that?"

"You said you would stay."

"Yeah, stay here. It's not like I am going anywhere anyway," you let out a slight, maniacal giggle.

"This conversation is not leading anywhere. I will wait for your final decision,” he remarked as he was about to leave.

"Pff, boring. Don't you ever have anything fun to do?" As he was about to walk away, you grab his hand.

"Let go."

"Loosen up a little," you said. "I bet you never had real fun before." His hand slightly quivered, making you feel more powerful. "Did you know, fear can lead to arousal."

Within a second, you pull his hand towards in between your thighs. Biting your bottom lip, you lock his hand until all he could do is try to struggle to release it. "Aa, fuck~ You know you want to.~"

He stops after his second attempt to release his hand, staring dead into your eyes.

"You are making a mistake."

"Puh-lease, I am only helping you," you answer. "It's clear to me that you don’t follow anything beyond your orders. I am the one giving you a chance now, a chance for your freedom, a chance to take what you deserve."

"What exactly do you think you can give me?"

"Everyone needs a little slut to show what one is really capable of," you remark in a suggestive tone, "Or perhaps you actually like being a little bitch who obeys commands." He makes no comment.

Your moans mixed with small cackles as you grinded yourself on his hand. "Aaa~ Mister, or do you prefer master? You are going to make me come~"

Roughly, he pulls his hand away, claiming back his ownership. "That's enough."

“Pussy,” you pouted while you watch him take his gloves off. “You can’t stay like this forever. Even someone like you will end up snapping.”

“You act like you know what I need, but I can easily see what you truly desire.”

He certainly knew how to keep stoic. “And what might that be?”

“You act like you are divine, but even you know it’s to hide how pathetic you really are,” he stated.

“You better watch your words, Mr Front Man.”

“Along with that, the lack of physical contact has driven you to feel desire in many different ways,” he said while still sounding monotonous. “You have reached so low that you crave the slightest forms of touch. I can see the temptation right through your eyes.”

“What are you, a detective?”

“Maybe I was.”

You were about to make another silly remark, but while you least expected it the Front Man cuffed your free hand onto the chair.

“Hey, what do you think you ar-” before you could finish, the Front Man’s hand slipped in between your legs, lining up with your entrance.

The sudden loss of dominance silenced you. You tried to struggle your way out, but all you could feel was the presence of the man in front of you enjoying it. Maybe deep down, you actually wanted this shift of power.

His fingers outlined your passage. “This should help you behave.”

“I could kill you for this you know?”

“Why would you? ‘You know you want to’,” his final comment was before he forcibly slid one of his fingers in. Ah, you felt yourself wrap around him. His constant glaze at you made you feel more embarrassed than you should. God, he was really showing you who was in charge here. Slowly, he built up momentum, pushing his finger in and out of your insides. He explored through your tunnel in many ways, enough to prevent each other from getting bored.

Another one slipped in, creating a scissoring motion inside you. You bite your cheeks in order to hide any unwanted sounds coming out of your mouth. Fuck, why was he good at this? He penetrated his fingers in you steadily, but with a strong passion. He knows how to make you feel good. If he kept this up he might as well-

A third finger slipped in, and this time you bite yourself harder. This is the most you recall ever being in you. The glare from behind the Front Man’s mask intensified as he kept tampering with your insides. It wasn’t clear whether he was constantly observing in case you escape, to make sure you were enjoying it, or just for him to see you weak. You didn’t know whether to moan loudly to spite him or to keep silent and show how much you hate being used as a tool. Like that would matter, he brought you here to use you in one way or another. It didn’t matter whether it was for your labour or his own personal pleasure. Just when you thought you could not get any more exposed and helpless, his touch suddenly sent a shock through your spine.

“Found it,” he said when he noticed your reaction, despite how hard you tried to hide that pleasure. His police instincts made him more perceptive than anyone else.

“Fuck you.”

“No, I am the one fucking you.” He strongly brushed his fingers past that one sweet spot, making you grunt.

Oh god, you were close. How could you possibly already come this close? Surely you could last at least a few minutes, he barely even did anything to you. But no, you were coming, and he knew it. His mask may be emotionless but his lust was clearly seen. Just as you were about to climax, he drew his fingers back out.

“What the fuck?”

“I thought you didn’t like it.”

“Didn’t mean you could stop.”

“Why should I keep going? You are no use to me.”

Damn, he was making you do it no matter what.

“Fine, I will join your team or whatever. Just don’t leave me turned on here like this!”

“I can do whatever I want with you.” Man, was he really testing your limits. “Not only will you listen and work with us, but you will learn to respect the way we do things here. Only then, I will reward you.”

There was nothing you could do. Your desire had grown way too far, and there was no stopping now. You couldn’t kill him either, not like this. What was the worst that could happen?

“Alright, I promise I will be an obedient little pig. Just hurry up and finish what you started.”

[shemarmooresfedora]

Home

Series Summary: After being arrested, Spencer Reid desperately tries to get back home to his daughter, Camellia, who was placed into foster care in your home.

Pairing: Single!Dad!Spencer x Foster!Mom!Reader

Word Count: 1.7k

Content/Warnings: mentions of Diana’s Alzheimer’s and Schizophrenia, prison, separation of father and daughter, swearing

A/N: i hope you guys enjoy my new fic! this may be about 8 chapters or so! i’m not sure yet, going to see how interested people are in the plot :) (also quick disclaimer: i have never been in the foster care system so please excuse any inaccuracies)

Masterlist

Chapter 1

Spencer never wanted his daughter to see him like this, being brought into the BAU bullpen in handcuffs. He was supposed to be the good guy.

Right now, he couldn’t tell if he still was. He had good intentions going down to Mexico to get non-FDA approved medicine for his mom but he may have killed someone in the process. If only he could just remember.

Camellia ran into his arms to hug him, a hug he so desperately wanted to return if it wasn’t for these stupid cuffs around his wrists.

“They can’t just take you away, Dad,” she cried.

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I’m going to get back to you as soon as possible,” he promised, kissing the top of her head.

Spencer felt absolutely crushed as the guards had to drag his crying 11-year-old off of him so he could be taken to his holding cell.

-

You had just gotten off of work when your phone rang. Eileen, the head foster care coordinator, was calling.

“Hello,” you answered.

“Hey Y/N,” she greeted you, “I know you haven’t had a foster kid in a few months but I kind of have an urgent case. 11-year-old sixth grade girl. Mom has been out of the picture for a while, Dad recently imprisoned and on trial for murder. There are a bunch of family friends willing to take her but no direct family,” she explained.

“I can take her for as long as she needs,” you told Eileen.

“Great! I’ll text you the address, it’s the FBI headquarters.”

-

When you walked into the BAU, still in your dino scrubs and white lab coat, Eileen was surrounded by a frantic group of people.

“As I said before, I don’t doubt any of your credentials but this is the law. We can only give away a child to direct family at this point in time. If you are not direct family, you will need a lawyer to fight for custody as well as permission from her father but that process could take months,” Eileen stated.

“Spencer hasn’t spoken to his father in years and his mother is in a facility for her schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s,” a dark-haired woman spoke.

“Exactly so she must be turned over to the foster care system. I apologize to you all but this is how it works. We can’t bend the rules,” Eileen said.

“I don’t want Callie fending for herself in a house with 20 other kids,” a blonde-haired woman argued, “I’m her godmother. She stays with me all the time. She was staying with me while Spencer was in Mexico.”

“Sorry, my answer is still no. But, hopefully this will squash your concerns, Y/N!” she called you over, “This is Y/N. Jo will be placed with her. She is a pediatric doctor and currently has no other foster kids at the moment but all of her past kids have absolutely adored her. She always passes her surprise safety and wellness checks with flying colors.

“Hi,” you waved, intimidated by this huge group of frustrated people with guns on their hips.

“A doctor? So she isn’t even going to be home most of the time,” a curly-haired man scoffed.

“Actually, I own my own practice. I don’t work at a hospital so I usually have a regular 8-4 shift unless one of my patients needs urgent attention,” you clarified.

“JJ, don’t make me go,” a girl, who you could only assume was Callie, sobbed.

They were all staring at you like you were the worst person on Earth. You wanted to shrivel up and die. When you went through the process of becoming a foster parent, you thought this was a very admirable thing to do. You just wanted to provide a good home to kids in need.

“Do any of you have a key to Dr. Reid’s residence so Camellia can pack a bag?” you asked politely.

The woman closest to Callie that must be JJ pulled a key off of her chain and handed it to you.

“I’ll-um-leave my phone number and address here so you guys can contact me at any time or stop by. I understand your concerns but please know I try my absolute hardest to make sure all kids feel welcome and safe in my house,” you scribbled your information down on a scrap piece of paper.

“Are you ready to go, Camellia?” you asked softly.

She went around hugging everyone in the circle before solemnly nodding to you.

God, you felt like such an asshole.

-

After Callie finished packing her things from her bedroom in relative silence, you returned to the car.

“I don’t know what you like to eat but we can stop at the grocery store so we can get stuff you like and any other things you need,” you said.

You were met with silence from the backseat. You offered for her to sit in the passenger seat but she declined.

“Listen, I’m really not trying to be the bad guy here. Please don’t make me out to be one. I know you are having a tough time with your Dad’s situation right now but shutting everyone else out won’t help,” you spoke softly, “Trust me, I know.”

You sighed when the silence continued. You pulled out of the Reid’s driveway and headed to the grocery store.

-

You let Callie lead when you entered the grocery store, opting to follow behind her with the cart. She went immediately to the frozen meal section and started throwing them in.

“Camellia, that’s fine if those are what you want but just so you know, I love to cook so I can make you anything you want,” you offered.

“This is what I’m used to,” she spoke sharply, “My dad is not a bad dad, he just usually doesn’t have much time.”

“I never claimed he was,” you defended yourself.

After that, you kept your mouth shut. Clearly, she was a very independent girl and she had her own routine she liked to stick to.

-

You hauled all the grocery bags inside the house and unloaded them as Callie brought in her suitcases.

“So Camellia, I put all the food you picked out in these two cabinets. I mean obviously, you are welcome to anything in the kitchen but I just wanted you to know where the things you picked out were. I always have a grocery list on the fridge that you can add to,” you began to give her a tour of the house, “Bathroom is in there. There’s another upstairs. Here’s the living room with a TV,” you headed up the stairs, “Here’s my room.”

On your bed was an adorable toyger kitten cuddled up on your pillow.

“Oh! This is Winnie like Winnie the Pooh. I just got her a few weeks ago from a shelter. She is super friendly and loves snuggles so she will probably try to sneak into your bed unless you keep your door closed.”

“I don’t mind,” Callie spoke softly as she petted Winnie.

You smiled softly. These were the first words you got out of her that weren’t a rejection.

You continued the tour, “There’s a bathroom between our rooms but I tend to use the downstairs one so feel free to make it your own. And here’s your room,” you opened the door to a white room with a queen bed in the center, a small bookshelf, a few plants, and paintings.

“I hope this is good enough for now. We can go out this weekend to a home goods store if you want to redecorate. I’d even be open to repainting it if you want,” you offered.

Callie just set her bags down and nodded.

“Alright, I’ll leave you be. I’ll probably be downstairs for a while watching TV if you want to join. Let me know if you want me to make you anything,” you began to shut the door but Winnie slipped in first.

“Good night, you guys,” you smiled softly.

-

“Do you want me to wait out here or come in with you?” you asked softly.

Spencer had been denied bail, meaning he was transferred to a federal prison and Callie was going to be staying with you for a while. She had taken the news rather hard as expected when the team came over to your house to tell her. You still weren’t really accepted by the group so you mostly stood in the corner of the kitchen while they were all in your living room.

You had spoken to Eileen several times about Callie’s current situation. She gave you permission to do whatever you saw fit. This means you could opt her out of school one or two days a week if she wasn’t feeling up to it as long as she emailed her teachers and got her missed work in on time. You were researching different therapists for her to talk to because she didn’t seem to want to open up to you. You were also given a schedule of visiting times for her to visit her dad in prison.

“I’ll just go in alone,” she walked in the door to the visiting room, leaving you in the waiting room.

-

“Dad,” Callie tried to hug Spencer but the guard pointed to the ‘No Touching’ sign posted on the wall.

They both sat down defeatedly at opposite ends of the table.

“How are you?” Callie inquired, wiping her tears away from seeing her father locked up.

“I don’t want to talk about me, sweetheart. How are you? Emily and my lawyer visited yesterday and told me you had to be placed into foster care,” Spencer asked, concerned.

“It’s okay. Not the best,” she sighed.

“What’s happening? Are they hurting you? Are they not giving you enough to eat? Callie, I’ll have my lawyer on the phone and you out of there so quick,” Spencer frantically stated.

“No, Dad. Y/N is fine…nice, even. But she’s not you,” Callie cried.

Spencer’s face softened, “I’m so sorry, Callie. You don’t deserve to be dealing with any of this.”

“Just please come home,” she sniffled.

“I’m trying, sweetheart, I’m really trying,” he replied earnestly with tears in his eyes.

A/N: i will also be starting a series taglist if you don’t want to be added to my main taglist so just clarify which one you want to join! also i recommend listening to the song Home by Phillip Phillips because it is kind of like the theme song for this story

main taglist (just ask to be added/removed!): @samuel-de-champagne-problems @g0lden-cth @spencerreid9 @averyhotchner @coldlilheart @k-k0129 @ickleronniekinsemotionalrange @harrystylesandthegoobs @cmily @jswessie187 @rem-ariiana @hoodpankow @mochionly @spencerreid-187 @babymetaldoll @fics4arainyday @ssavanessa22 @all-tings-diego

series taglist: @ilovespencerreidmarryme

[phoenixyfriend]

Auntie ‘Soka and Little Leia (and Rex)

The counterpart to Uncle Ben and Little Luke (Original Post, Chrono)

Listen. You all knew this was coming.

This got... very long and detailed and I’m going to have to clean it up and post to AO3. As in, this was supposed to be 2-3k and is literally ten times that long. It crossed 25k. And the initial section actually glosses over a bunch, actual fic-style writing starts at “That, of course, is when things get interesting.”

Warnings: discussion of various canon traumas (most relating to being child soldiers), general PTSD, several scenes featuring dissociation or panic attacks upon being triggered, and canon-typical violence.

Rated T, gen.

I still want there to be de-aging nonsense involved so Ahsoka is physically a late teenager despite having a solid two decades of field experience behind her (we’re pulling her from Malachor).

Leia, much like Luke, is now six. She just came from being a rebellion general. She is not happy about being a child. She was already short, this is just mean.  She’s a human espresso.

UNLIKE BEN, Ahsoka is not happy about this turn of events. Being seventeen-ish is not helpful in the outer rim. She’s a female togruta, young and healthy, and in the Outer Rim, caring for a small human child. Sure, she has her lightsabers and plenty of combat experience, and she can keep them safe, but she’s just one person, and a major target for those looking to make some quick cash. It doesn’t matter how good she is; she needs sleep at some point.

It makes my heart happy to treat Ahsoka and Rex as two halves of the same black ops specialist so you know what, he’s there too! He’s physically like... 10-12 in natborn, maybe. They’re not sure, because clones age weird. He’s moderately more useful than Leia (who is very competent but also physically six, and short for that age), but he’s still... very small.

Reminder that none of them have been born yet.

Ahsoka has a harder time explaining WHY she has children with her, since she's barely more than a kid herself, and clearly unrelated by species. She sometimes just says “Oh, my adoptive brother’s kids” since it’s kind of the truth for Leia and she’s not touching the actual truth about Rex with a ten foot pole.

Ahsoka definitely knows about Leia being a Skywalker, or at least has suspicions that Bail never outright confirmed but was conspicuously quiet about. She does tell Leia about it, but it’s not like that means anything, right? Just, you know, your dad was my teacher! I don’t have to tell you he became Va--oh shit, you already knew that part. Well, fuck. What do you mean he had a son? OH SHIT, PADME HAD TWINS.

Alt take for explaining why she’s got kids: She’s my foundling, I know her name as my child (Leia shut up!!!)

(Ahsoka can fake Mandalore. Sometimes.)

That said, there is... significantly less gambling and significantly more theft to get to Coruscant.

As previously stated, Ahsoka is a black ops kinda gal, and more importantly, she looks like a fairly attractive young woman in the Outer Rim, with two children in good health. She’s a target, and also not the kind of person one generally gambles with. If she does gamble, people get upset when she doesn’t lose, in ways they don’t get upset about Ben doing the same, because she’s, again, a cute teenage girl. It’s exhausting.

As things go, she largely ends up stealing from people who deserve it and/or smuggling herself and her charges into someone else’s ship. They’re small, they can hide. Sometimes she can get them all passage by working as a mechanic, she’s good at that.

Once they’ve got a handle on when they are, they have to decide on Names. None of them have been born yet, so technically they could use their own names without anyone Knowing. Rex and Leia might not even be born, depending on how successful they are at, you know, stopping the war and everything. Ahsoka, though, she’s going be born in two years, and there’s no reason to prevent it, so... she doesn’t want to steal baby-her’s name. That would be mean.

Leia is already calling her “Auntie ‘Soka” when she can for reasons like “selling the bit” and “manipulating adults” and “making us both feel better after we had a mutual breakdown about Anakin being Vader.” Ergo, she decides that whatever new name she picks better include that in some way, and decides on “Sokari” because it sounds pretty.

Overall, they don’t... they don’t actually make it very far before there’s an Incident. Again, teenager with small children. They spend a lot of time hiding out in space ports looking for an opportunity.

That, of course, is when things get interesting.

Specifically, Ahsoka spots a Mandalorian.

She doesn’t recognize the armor. She does recognize the sigil, and thinks ‘well, they’re more likely to help than some,’ because from what she’s heard, the Haat Mando’ade are Decent People Overall. Her view is a little biased, mostly on account of the sheer level of grudge she has against Kyr’tsad. It’s fine! The True Mandalorians have the same grudge, right? And Mandalorians like kids and Ahsoka hasn’t slept in five days and it’s fine. It’s fine! IT’S FINE.

“Oh shit,” Rex whispers, before she can suggest anything. “Oh fuck.”

“Stop cursing,” Leia hisses, elbowing him. “People are going to notice.”

“That’s the Prime,” Rex panics, mostly quiet. Ahsoka’s heart drops, because fuck is right. “That’s Fett.”

Leia isn’t impressed. Ahsoka just angles herself between Fett and Rex and hopes that he doesn’t see them. That’s just asking for trouble.

Unfortunately, Ahsoka is in fact running on none sleep with left trauma, and doesn’t notice Fett walking up and dropping into a seat across from them until he’s actually done so, removing his helmet to glare a little more efficiently.

“Wanna explain why your kid has my face?”

Ahsoka later tells herself that he’s killed Jedi and that’s why he can sneak up on her, and that she can be forgiven some slip-ups with the exhaustion being what it is, and that she’s obviously going to be dealing with some emotional instability in light of the sudden return of teenage hormones and new forms of anxiety that are markedly different from those she was dealing with a few weeks ago.

What Ahsoka wants to say is “that’s kind of a long story,” or “maybe he’s a cousin,” or “kriff off, I don’t know you,” or maybe even “he’s a clone.”

What Ahsoka actually does is burst into tears, which is embarrassing for her, for Fett, for the kids, and for the entire rest of the bar.

It really is the straw that broke the eopie’s back. Even when she was actually this age, she didn’t exactly cry much. Objectively, Fett quasi-aggressively asking a valid question shouldn’t send her into a panic. She’s been through torture and worse. She shouldn’t be crying.

But she is, sobbing her eyes out with no control, and he’s just sitting across from her and looking uncomfortable while Rex wraps his little arms--oh Force he’s so small--around her, and both ‘children’ glare at Fett.

“So, I’m going to take it she didn’t kidnap you from a loving family or do something illicit with a blood sample,” Fett says, after it becomes obvious that Ahsoka’s not going to be ready to talk any time soon.

“She didn’t,” Rex says stiffly, with just the right emphasis for Fett to catch what’s implied. Ahsoka just keeps her head down, eyes pressed against the heels of her palms, trying to get her body to stop rebelling against her.

Fett’s eyes dart to Leia, who folds her arms and draws herself up, every bit the unimpressed princess. “My father claimed her as a sister, so she’s my Auntie ‘Soka.”

The man dithers a bit, the conversation clearly not going where he’d expected. “Right,” he says. “You--you’re all kids. I thought she was a little older, at least, but I didn’t have a good look at her face before.”

She is older, but actually admitting that is only going to make this worse, both for her pride and for her chances of making it out alive.

“Where are you staying?”

“What?” Leia bites out.

“You’re kids, you’re alone, and you’re clearly not okay if you were trying to hide the one with my face as blatantly as you did, and then... whatever this is, when I confronted you,” Fett explains. Ahsoka lifts her head to glare at him, but it’s probably not doing much with the way her eyes are rimmed with red and still wet. “Don’t give me that look, ad’ika, your kids looked as confused and horrified by that as the bartender did. They obviously didn’t think it was normal either.”

Well, kriff you too, Ahsoka thinks.

“And what do you mean by ‘blatantly,’ here?” Leia challenges. It’s adorable, but Ahsoka watched this tiny girl shoot a man last week, and wonders when people are going to start taking that seriously.

“There’s a lot of people in this galaxy, and I don’t exactly have the clearest memory of what I looked like at that age,” Fett says, slow and careful like he thinks they’re dumb. Ahsoka decides to chalk it up as being because Leia’s visibly six. “I would have thought it was just a coincidence if you hadn’t put in effort to hide him.”

Leia huffs, and Rex glares harder. Fett just sighs, like they’re all going to give him grey hairs.

“You can explain whatever the hell’s going on,” Fett says. “I’ll let you stay on my ship, there’s a spare bunk and you’re small.”

“For free?” Rex demands.

“A night on a bunk in exchange for information,” Fett clarifies. “We can negotiate from there.”

Ahsoka takes a few moments, notes that both of the others are waiting on her for the decision, and cringes. She doesn’t feel steady enough to carry that. She has to anyway.

“Rex?” she asks, voice rasping after the breakdown of the past few minutes.

“Yeah?”

“How much?”

He looks up at her, eyes calculating, and grimaces. “We don’t want Order 66. A warning is better, even if we... share information.”

She nods, and turns to Leia. “Any premonitions, princess?”

Leia glowers, cute and furious. “No.”

“No, don’t tell, or no, you aren’t getting any vibes about sharing info one way or the other?”

“The latter,” Leia clarifies, huffy to the last.

“Right,” Ahsoka says, and then just... hesitates. “Fett...”

“You’ve got conditions,” he guesses.

She bares her teeth in what could have, through a squint and perhaps a few drinks, been called an apologetic smile. “Just one, really.”

“Yeah?”

“No hurting, killing, or turning us in for bounties,” she says. “Any of us.”

“You’re children, I wouldn’t.”

She blinks at him, slow and careful. She hesitates. She reaches down, out of sight, sees him stiffen.

She unclips her sabers from her belt and puts them on the table.

His eyes are fixed on the weapons the second they enter his line of sight, and don’t move as he clearly realizes why she made the condition she did.

“I left years ago, because I couldn’t stay without it ruining me,” she says. Still slow. Still careful. She’s so tired. “But if I want to keep Leia safe, I have to get back to Coruscant.”

His eyes finally lift from the sabers, expression blank. “Just her?”

“Rex doesn’t have the same monsters coming after him,” she says. “If it were just me and him, I’d worry less. Leia’s a different kind of target.”

“You’re putting a lot of faith on the table by telling me that,” Fett says, voice flat and toneless. “Considering my occupation.”

“She’s a child,” Ahsoka says, feeling heavy and boneless. “Even with what I was and will be, even with what money you would get from the right buyer, you wouldn’t.”

“There are other risks.”

“There are.”

They stare at each other for too long, probably, and then Fett jerks as Rex kicks him under the table. The boys glare for a moment, and then Rex says, “If she weren’t good, I’d still be a slave to those who grew me.”

Fett blinks, and then nearly growls the word, “What?”

“She freed me,” Rex reiterates. “While I was trying to shoot her.”

Ahsoka lifts a hand and puts it on his far shoulder, pulling him into her side. She doesn’t meet Fett’s eyes again, because part of her is back on Mandalore, dodging her own soldiers and crying out as her family dies across the galaxy.

Fett breathes in. Breathes out. He puts a hand to his head, visibly frustrated. “Fine. A good Jedi kid, and two smaller kids, one of which is apparently in some way mine.”

Rex makes a face, which is fair, but also not helping.

“To the ship,” Ahsoka says, putting her sabers back on her belt and sliding out of the seat. “I’m... I’m Sokari.”

“You already know my name.”

“I do.”

---------------------------

Fett watches her like she’s a predator, which has the benefit of being accurate and slightly flattering. She lets other two take care of most of talking, and then Fett tells her to sleep first, and talk in the morning.

“You’re dead on your feet, jetii,” he snorts. “And that crying jag didn’t do you any favors. Sleep.”

So she does, and Fett doesn’t even wake her. He just lets her sleep. He watches her in the way of a guard. She sees him when she gets up to use the ‘fresher in the middle of the night, but he doesn’t even comment when she collapses right back into the mediocre cot she’s borrowed for the cycle.

Rex and Leia are safe, her hindbrain tells her, even in the depths of sleep. Her mind curls around theirs in the Force, and she trusts that they are here. They are not happy, but they are alive and unharmed, and that has to be enough.

When she stumbles her way to true wakefulness, groggy and loose-limbed, Fett greets her with caf.

“The kids wouldn’t let me near you,” he tells her.

“They’re good,” she says, cupping her hands around the mug. She feels wobbly, in every sense. Her body, her mind, her emotions, her connection to the Force. Nothing is on-kilter right now. “Did they tell you anything?”

“They waited for you,” he says. “But the little miss needed a nap of her own. They’re down in the other bunk.”

“I didn’t notice,” she admits. She should have. She’s Fulcrum. She’s a veteran of the Clone Wars. She’s... she’s supposed to be better than this.

“How long?” he asks, and then when she squints up at him, he clarifies. “How long did you fight?”

“My last fight--”

“No, whatever war you came out of,” he says. Her chest twists cold. “I don’t know if the Jedi sent you into it or if you waded in yourself once you left, but you move like a soldier.”

“I was,” she confirms. “But... but I don’t want to talk about the details. Not until the other two are here.”

He frowns at her. “Is there anything you can talk about?”

She shrugs and looks away, trying to take solace in the warmth of the caff she holds above the table, as if it can hide her, guard her, from the disgraced Mand’alor across the table.

“Jedi?”

“I’m not officially a Jedi,” she says, voice quiet. “Not anymore.”

“Then what do I call you?” he asks. “We’re not exactly close enough for names.”

“Torrent,” she says. “It’s not--I can’t claim my family name anymore. But I can claim Torrent, so I will. And if you want a title, I was a commander.”

“Bit young for that.”

“I got the rank when I was fourteen,” she says, and watches his face do something complicated and unpleasant. “Don’t. I know your own culture puts children on the field that young.”

“Not in command.”

She shrugs. “Yeah, well... the soldiers were technically younger. Adults, but...”

Ahsoka can see the way he casts about to figure out what species grows at that rate. He guesses a few, and she shoots all of it down.

She won’t tell him. Not until Rex is awake.

This part of the story is his.

--------------------------

When Leia tries to sit alone, a foot away on the bench like a proper adult, Ahsoka refuses to let it happen. She pulls the younger girl to her side and quells protests with a glance. It’s a decent skill, but she’s not sure how long it’s going to work on her niece-in-spirit.

“Your body needs the chemical release of skinship,” she says, and Leia glares at her. “I spent way too much time with the boys to not know about this. Deal.”

Rex sits close enough to knock their knees together under the table, and his warmth is the old comfort she needs.

“Do you want the story you’ll believe, or the truth?” Ahsoka asks.

“What’s the difference?”

“One of them involves something so impossible that even most Jedi wouldn’t believe it,” she tells him.

Fett folds his arms and leans forward to rest them on the table, challenging but oddly open. “Try me.”

“Time travel.”

He blinks, just once, fully controlled. “That’s a tough one.”

“There were only three Jedi left alive when I died,” she says. “Or... whatever it is that happened to me. I think I died. All I know is that one moment, I was thirty-two and dying, and the next, I was... seventeen again, and had these two with me. All of us younger than we were. None of us have even been born yet.”

She refuses to look him in the eye. “They both outlived me by... six years, maybe. Got caught up while traveling instead of dying. Leia was twenty-two. Rex was thirty-five. I’m not technically the oldest anymore. I mean, physically I am, but that doesn’t mean anything, and it’s not exactly doing us any good, and--”

Rex bumps his shoulder to her arm. “I dunno, Commander. I’ve spent a long time looking older than I should. Nice to look younger for once.”

She shoots him a small, pained grin. “Could be worse, yeah.”

“Let’s say I believe you.”

Her attention snaps back to Fett, who’s looking damnably blank, and is showing even less in the Force.

He waits a second for her to relax back into her seat.

“Let’s say I believe you,” he repeats. “How’s ‘Rex’ connected to me? What’s so special about Leia there? And what war did you fight in that has you acting like a veteran?”

“Three years in the clone wars,” she whispers, glancing to Rex and forcing herself to not go for her sabers to defend against an attack that her paranoia says is coming and the Force says is not. “Then almost all the Jedi were wiped out at once, and I spent a year... drifting. Then black ops for the next fifteen.”

“Black ops,” he repeats, still damnably flat.

“There was a Sith Empire,” she says, and she can hear her own tone growing somehow emptier. “Glassing planets. Enslaving entire species. Committing genocides all over. Of course, there was a rebellion, and of course I joined it. I was one of the only people left with Jedi training. For all that I’d left the Order, I still had a duty to the universe.”

His eyes flit to Leia, who shrugs and tries to look prim. “I was adopted and raised by one of the founders of the rebellion, a movement built on the desire to instate freedom and democracy in a galaxy that had lost even the pretense.”

“That why you’re special?”

Leia smiles, thin and patronizing. It doesn’t fit on her little face. “I’m special because my biological father was one of the most powerful Force users in history, and his Fall to the dark side and choice to become a Sith is why the Emperor’s rise was nearly uncontested. I do not like power, but it’s in my veins and I can’t change that. Force users are... a lucrative trade, and I’m still the size of a child, so I can’t fight back. I’ll be safer in the Jedi Temple, even if I don’t want to be a Jedi.”

Fett looks to Ahsoka, makes to ask a question, and then shakes his head. Not the time, maybe.

“So, that’s all... very complicated and I don’t know how much of it I believe, but it doesn’t explain...” he trails off, and sighs. “My kid, or whatever you are. I heard you mention clones.”

Rex grins. It is not a kind expression.

“Let me tell you about Kamino.”

---------------------------

Ahsoka has no idea if Fett believes them. Either he thinks they’re telling the truth, or he thinks their delusional kids. Whatever the case, he offers to take them closer to the Core. Ahsoka quietly offers to take a look at his engine in return, and then pretends not to notice when Fett awkwardly drifts to and away from Rex.

“They put chips in our brains to make us kill the Jedi we respected, cared for, even loved. I tried to shoot ‘Soka, Fett. She was seventeen and risked her life to get that chip out of my head while I was trying to kill her. I have never hated myself more than when I woke up and realized what I’d almost done, and I was one of the few that were able to fight it. I heard the stories of dozens of brothers who woke with their chips having degraded and chose to eat their blaster rather than live with the guilt of the orders they’d followed without question because of a thrice-damned Sith slave chip in their head.”

“So no, I won’t call you father or acknowledge you as clan until you do something to prove you’re worth it, shared blood or not.”

What Ahsoka does get out of the arrangement, for all that Fett’s route mostly takes them on a meandering path that isn’t faster than their previous system, is sleep. She gets to rest. She gets to trust that Fett won’t kill Rex, out of guilt for something he hasn’t done, that he won’t kill Leia out of a worry that she’s just a delusional child, a real child, that he won’t kill ‘Sokari’ because it would ruin any chance of gaining Rex’s favor, ever.

She’s not safe, won’t believe she can be until she’s in the Temple and Sidious is dead dead dead, but she’s safer than she’s been in a long time.

Every night, Ahsoka wakes up and stumbles to the little galley, deaths and torture sparkling behind her eyes with the energy of a thousand lost Jedi, ten thousand mourned brothers and sisters.

She is not the only one of their little group to be a survivor of a near-total genocide, but Rex could not feel his brothers die in the Force, even if his nightmares featured what they heard of suicide missions by the emperor’s favored shock troopers, and Leia had... Alderaan had more off-world survivors than there had been Jedi at all.

It’s not worth comparing their pain. It’s stupid to even think it. Part of her can’t help but do it anyway.

“Caf?”

She feels a lek twitch in response to the voice of the only other person on board who can reach the top shelf. “I probably shouldn’t.”

“Whiskey?”

“That’s a definitely shouldn’t.”

“Hoth chocolate?”

“...please.”

She doesn’t lift her head from her arms until the mug clicks down in front of her, ceramic on plastisteel.

“Do I ask what it was this time?”

She shrugs. “It’s hard to explain to non-sensitives.”

“Try me anyway.”

Ahsoka twists the Hoth chocolate in her hands, takes a sip as she thinks. “The Force isn’t just one thing. It’s... energy and philosophy and spirit, a sense of being that ties the entire universe together. Sentient and inanimate and living and dead, empty space and lush forests and stifled cities. For those of us who are sensitive to it, it’s possible to feel the life of everyone around you, theoretically possible to feel entire systems. If you have a Force bond, like a master and padawan, that can stretch across planets, even systems if one or both are particularly powerful.

“So just... just imagine, for a moment, what it’s like to feel the screaming of all those Jedi in the Force as their trusted men shot them down.

“Some of them were close enough that I could feel them die,” she manages. “I... it’s horrible. It’s horrific. It’s not something I can ever forget, and I want to. I want to forget what that moment was like. Not that it happened, but...”

She can feel the tears. Fuck..

“You want to dull the edges.”

“Don’t we all?” she asks, scrubbing the back of her hand across her eyes. “Leia lost her entire planet, billions of people, and she was forced to watch. Rex... Force, I can barely imagine, and I was there for most of it.”

Fett watches her, measuring. “From what he said, they were as much your brothers as his, by the end.”

“No,” she immediately denies. “They could have been, maybe, but the ones I was closest to died earlier, and then I left, and by the time the Empire rose, all but a handful were... no. Rex, I will claim as a brother in all the ways that matter, but I don’t get to do that with the rest. I don’t have the right.”

“You’re hard on yourself.”

“Fate of the galaxy, my good bitch. Guess who’s got it on her shoulders.”

He snorts at her, and nods at the mug. “Drink your Hoth chocolate. We’re landing in eight hours, and you’ve got kids to look out for.”

---------------------------

There’s a twitch in the Force when they land, something pulling at her in a way she barely feels. She’s had her shields up so fully for so long that it’s natural to hide away what she is to the point where she can hardly tell what anyone else is, either. It takes more than a moment to remember how to let herself spread out across the world.

“Auntie ‘Soka? Why’d you stop?”

She doesn’t have an answer to Leia’s prodding question. “I don’t know.”

It’s almost familiar. Old and half-forgotten, not the same as what she remembers, but--

“This way,” she says, and wanders off into the crowd. Leia and Rex follow without question. Fett curses and rushes through the rest of his transaction with the docking attendant. The sound of him jogging after them is almost funny, with the armor, but she can’t focus on that.

Ahsoka slips between people with the ease of a career built on such a habit, children trailing like ducklings. She knows this feeling, she knows this person, what is she missi--

“Oh,” she breathes, going stock still. She knows that face. She knows those braids. She even knows the presence.

Younger than Ahsoka had ever seen her, but unmistakably Master Billaba.

“Torrent, what the hell?” Fett demands, finally catching up. “You can’t just run off like that!”

“It’s Depa,” she says, eyes still fixed on the woman parsing through a datapad with an irritated vendor. She has a padawan braid. It doesn’t feel like Master Windu is on-planet, so this might be a solo mission, a... oh. Senior Padawan, Knight Elect. This is the kind of mission taken to test if she’s ready to be promoted.

Ahsoka feels light-headed.

Fett waits for her to elaborate, but she can’t. This was Kanan’s master. This was a member of the High Council. This was a woman who died and--

“You need to sit down,” Fett says, not a touch gruff. He puts a hand on her shoulder and guides her off the main walkway. “I’m... going to talk to the woman in the Jedi robes. You three just stay there and don’t get kidnapped.”

Ahsoka nods, feeling like she’s not quite inhabiting her own body.

It’s Depa.

Her eyes track Fett without conscious control, and her montrals pick up the sound.

Depa looks up when the armor comes close enough, free hand tensed in a way that says she’s preventing herself from reaching for a saber in reaction to the heavily-armored individual standing several feet away.

“Mando,” the woman says. “May I help you?”

“Are you Depa?”

Depa doesn’t do anything so dramatic as gape or step back, but she does blink rapidly for a moment. She then folds her hands down in front of her, drawing her spine up ramrod straight. “I am Jedi Padawan Depa Billaba, yes. May I ask why it is that you need to know?”

Ahsoka imagines Fett grimacing, or rolling his eyes, or maybe dithering. She can’t tell from this angle, and he has a helmet on besides. It turns his awkward silences into judgmental ones.

“I’ve had some Jedi kids on my ship, hitching a ride,” he says at length. “One of them recognized you and then just... froze.”

“You have our younglings in your care,” Depa says, carefully not accusatory, but close enough to be a warning.

“Not quite,” he says. “The one that actually came from the temple is seventeen. One of ‘em isn’t Force Sensitive, and the last one is but hasn’t been to Coruscant before. They’re trying to get the little one to the Temple for her own safety.”

Depa considers that, and then passes the datapad to the vendor. “Lead on.”

It’s surprisingly simple, really. Fett did all the talking.

And then Depa is standing right in front of her.

“Like I said,” Fett sighs. “She froze up.”

“Hello,” Depa says, hands laced together inside her sleeves. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

Ahsoka shakes her head. “I know of you. I’ve seen you spar. You’ve never spoken to me.”

All true. A little misleading, but it’s fine, it’s all fine.

Depa waits a moment, and then says, “You seem to have me at a disadvantage. You know my name, but I don’t know yours.”

“Sokari T-Torrent,” she manages. The words feel clunky in her mouth, the sound abrasive for all that it’s just her own voice, no different from usual. A little shaky, maybe. She can feel a cool breeze on her upper arms. Shouldn’t she have armor? She should have armor. “It... it’s been a long time since I’ve seen another Jedi. I’m having a hard time believing you’re real.”

“I see,” Depa says. “Perhaps we should take this somewhere more private? You seem a little unsteady.”

Ahsoka lets herself be led back to the ship, in the company of Mand’alor Jango Fett, Jedi Padawan Depa Billaba, Princess-General Leia Organa, and good old Captain Rex.

It’s like the start of a sick joke.

---------------------------

Fett and Depa talk where she can hear, but they rarely address her directly. Both seem to realize that she’s not particularly useful right now. Leia and Rex are pressing up against her at the little table in the galley, and Ahsoka lets them.

This is real. She can feel Depa in the Force, recognizes her energy even if it’s not quite what it will-was-could-have-been. This is happening.

It’s a textbook Traumatic Stress Response case, one of them says.

Fett has his helmet off. Ahsoka’s sure that’s wrong for some reason. She thinks he might already be on wanted lists. Should she worry about Depa trying to arrest him?

Depa asks about Rex at one point. Fett tells her that someone cloned him without his knowing, but the kid is more comfortable with Ahsoka so they’re still working on what that means for him.

It’s more or less true. Rex squeezes her hand the one time someone suggests separating them. She’s not letting that happen unless Rex wants to leave for whatever reason. They’ve worked apart before. They can do it again.

“Auntie Soka? You’re shivering.”

Is she?

Leia cuddles in closer, and Ahsoka runs a hand over her hair. It’s an absentminded motion, and for all that she knows Leia’s hair is fine as silk, it feels like plastic in the moment.

“I don’t think I’m okay,” Ahsoka announces. The words hang in the air like lead balloons, and she can feel Depa staring at her. “I haven’t been for a very long time.”

“Yeah, we noticed,” Fett says. “Do you need to lay down, Torrent?”

Does she?

“No,” she says. “I... I don’t know what I need.”

“The spicy drink,” Rex tells them. “It’s grounding.”

Right. That.

Fett goes to grab it, and Depa continues to watch.

“How long ago did you leave your master?” Depa asks. “Or... did he die?”

Ahsoka closes her eyes and shakes her head. She can feel the shivers now, tremors in her biceps and a shudder she can’t control in the height of her ribcage. Her teeth grind together, jaw like stone.

“You don’t have to answer that,” Depa assures her. “I’m... going to recommend you see a mind healer on Coruscant.”

That was a forgone conclusion.

A cup clinks onto the table. Fett’s back. “Drink.”

She does.

Depa and Fett continue discussing it as “the adults” at the table. She’s older than both of them. Rex is older than all of them. Ahsoka follows about half of what they say. She agrees with most of it. Rex bullies his way into speaking when she doesn’t, without her even asking, because he knows her mind as well as she does. Fett rolls with it. Depa lets him.

She’s going to reach out to the Temple and see about getting them a ride back to Imperial Center Coruscant.

Fett makes Soka go to bed, taking Leia with her.

---------------------------

She feels more like a person come morning.

Depa’s sitting at the table, datapad in her hands and caff on the table in front of her.

“Good morning,” Ahsoka says, rough and croaking, and Depa’s eyes flick up to meet hers. She nods a shallow hello.

“Feeling better?”

“Much,” Ahsoka says, and goes about gathering a breakfast. There’s definitely some dried meat in here. She can get something fresh when they stop by the market later.

“I was hoping to speak with you about your options,” Depa tells her, once she’s sat at the table. “Fett and your friend Rex took care of most of the negotiation, and I feel like I have an idea of what would work best for you.”

Ahsoka nods slowly. “Okay.”

“There is a Master-Padawan pair a few planets away,” Depa says. “The Council informed me when I spoke with them about you and your wards. They’d be headed back to the Temple in a few days anyway, and the Council has agreed to extend an offer to Fett to handle the transportation. The presence of a Jedi Master on board will allow for him to get in and out of the Core unmolested, and we’d like for you and yours to have a Jedi escort, given what happened yesterday afternoon.”

Her complete spiral into nonbeing?

“I understand,” she says instead. “I suppose Fett agreed because he’s still trying to get Rex to like him?”

Depa shrugs. “That part isn’t my business.”

Of course it isn’t.

“Rex can stay with me for a while, right?” Ahsoka finally asks. “I know it’s not exactly protocol, but I’m...”

“In need of a support system until you’ve seen a mind healer, and against all odds, the child is part of it,” Depa summarizes. “Yes, I recognized as much. I think the Council will be able to allow some leeway there. I don’t know if he’ll enjoy it, given that all the others his age are Initiates, but we can adjust as necessary. On that note... Do you know Leia’s midichlorian count?”

“No,” Ahsoka says, and hesitantly adds, “But her biological father was my Jedi Master, and I’m told his count broke records even as a child. Given what Leia’s shown so far... it’s why I’ve been in a hurry to get her to the Temple.”

Depa frowns at her, clearly working through the implications of a Jedi having a daughter and still teaching... and then visibly dismisses the situation, eyes closing to breathe in the steam of her caff.

Biological father certainly implies a child that was raised by her mother or adopted out so the Jedi father could remain in their chosen career without a conflict of interest or duty.

She’ll tell the council the truth, or... at least Master Koon. Master Kenobi is still a padawan, but she can tell Master Koon.

She already told Jango Fett, of all people.

“Padawan Torrent?”

Her head snaps up. She hasn’t been a padawan in over fifteen years. It’s weird to hear. “I’m sorry, what?”

“I asked if you wanted some time to think it over before I presented the offer to Fett,” Depa says.

Ahsoka gets the distinct feeling that Depa is planning a report to the Council that has ‘needs a mind healer’ underlined at least three times.

“No, I’m--I’m fine. That sounds like a good plan.”

“I’ll speak with him, then. Would you like to come with?”

"No, thank you.”

---------------------------

Fett agrees. Ahsoka’s pretty sure it’s all to do with Rex and maybe Leia. It’s probably nothing to do with ‘Sokari.’ She’s a Jedi, an adult in mind and in body, or at least close enough to count. She’s a damn sight more ‘enemy’ to Fett than the other two are. Not as much as Depa, maybe, but Fett’s been playing nice with her for Leia’s sake.

He plays nice with Ahsoka for Rex’s. That’s all.

They’re only a few planets over from the meeting point, and they have a few days to hang around before the escort meets them. Depa hadn’t given them a name--apparently it could have compromised the opsec for the Jedi team--but Ahsoka’s pretty sure she’ll be able to identify almost anyone. She gets the feeling that the Force is going to send her a familiar face, just as it did Master Padawan Billaba.

Ahsoka lets herself feel the world around her. It’s dark and dreary, in the sense that the beaten-down port is full of petty crimes and less petty horrors, but it’s still lighter than most of the Empire had been. She sneaks away from the ship at night, ignoring Fett at her back, and performs a bit of vigilante justice while she can. She’ll be banned from doing so as soon as she’s reinstated as a Jedi, probably, but for now... for now, she can look at the drug cartels and ‘they’re not slaves, really’ workers and do something to help.

She doesn’t use her sabers. She doesn’t need to. It’s been a long time since she has, for small fry like these.

“What are you doing?” Fett asks her, landing heavily behind her back.

“Chip removal,” she says, hand pressed to the slave’s leg. Her eyes are closed, but she can hear him shifting. “Let me concentrate, I don’t have a meddroid for this.”

He’s silent until she finishes, and waits until the people she’s helped are on their way to the planet’s freedom routes. He doesn’t ask what she did with the owners.

“You’ve done this before.”

“Regularly,” she confirms. “You?”

He doesn’t answer that, just ambles over to the the chains and stares down at them.

“Fett?”

“You go through this like it’s as easy as breathing,” he says. “It’s... impressive.”

“I guess?” she hesitates to continue. “I’m... I don’t think of it that way. This is the easy stuff. A time-waster that helps people. If I wanted to help for real, I’d been going after Jabba or Sidious or--”

“How old were you?” he asks, turning on his heel to face her dead-on. The vocoder of his helmet pulls the emotion from his voice. “When did this... these missions, the slavery battles, when did that start for you?”

“Fourteen,” she says. She’s not entirely sure, really, what counted as a mission for ending slavery and what counted as just a part of war, but she can round down. “Maybe fifteen. It’s a bit of a blur.”

“And you just kept doing it.”

“Of course,” she says. “If I have the time and the energy, if I need to do something and there’s nothing official on my hands, why not?”

He doesn’t answer her.

---------------------------

Rex greets them before she does.

Ahsoka, in her defense, is asleep at the time. It’s a restless sleep, but it’s enough that she doesn’t sense the nearing Force signatures until they’re almost at the ship.

She recognizes one of them.

“Auntie ‘Soka?” Leia questions, when she lurches to her feet and starts pulling on her boots with all the energy of a zombie. “Where are you going?”

“Jedi,” Ahsoka grunts. “Here.”

“I see.”

Leia dresses to follow her, in a little coat that’ll withstand the chill of the outside air, and Ahsoka makes it to the cargo hold just in time to hear Rex saying, “I’m not shaking your hand until you put your gloves on, Vos.”

She laughs to herself, breathless with the knowledge of what she’s about to find. She jumps the railing of the upper walkway, drops down just in front of the Master-Padawan team, and keeps her back to Fett and Rex. “Hello, there.”

One human, one Kiffar. She knows the latter.

“Would you be Sokari Torrent?” the Master asks.

“I am,” she says, with a slight bow. She can tell there’s a bit of judgement for how she’s dressed, but they’re covering it well. A Shadow and his trainee know the value of armor better than most Jedi bother with. “I’m afraid Padawan Billaba didn’t inform me of your names before we met.”

“And yet your friend knew my padawan,” the Master says.

“By reputation,” she says, as smoothly as she can. “I’ve encountered Quinlan Vos before, though I doubt he remembers--”

“I’d remember someone like you,” Quinlan interrupts, with a grin she’s sure is meant to be charming and rogueish.

He’s... very young for her, and not her type. Mostly, she wants to pat him on the head, but that probably wouldn’t go over very well. She still looks like she’s younger than him.

“Anyway,” she says, turning back to the master, “I’m afraid I still don’t know who you are, Master.”

“I am Tholme,” he says, with the bow that a Master gives a Padawan. She feels a little slighted, but it’s fine. She looks the right age, it’s fine.

It’s not like they know.

“It’s nice to meet you, Master Tholme,” she says. “My charges are Rex Torrent, the young man behind me, and currently coming down the ladder is Leia Antilles. I’m sure you’re aware of Jango Fett.”

“The Mand’alor,” Quinlan volunteers, and Ahsoka can almost hear Fett’s teeth grinding.

“Don’t call me that,” he says. She’s sure he’s got a hand drifting for his blaster.

“There isn’t a whole lot of room on the ship,” she says before the men can get into whatever weird contest she’s sure someone might start. Her bet’s on Fett. “But Leia and Rex are small enough to share with me, so I’m sure we can make it work.”

“There’s spare rolls for anyone comfortable with sleeping in the hold,” Fett grunts. “Or on the floor in the passenger room.”

“Well, I guess I could ask for a little help fi--”

“Vos,” Ahsoka snaps, letting her voice take on the kind of ‘obey me or get fresher duty’ irritation that she’d perfected back when the rebellion still had her managing people, before they’d realized she was more use in the field. “Do not.”

There’s a moment’s pause, and Tholme looks unimpressed with that raised eyebrow, but the kind of unimpressed that’s split between his own padawan and the stranger before him.

“Um,” Quinlan says. “I just--”

“No,” she cuts him off. “No flirting.”

It’s weird and uncomfortable and she’d have maybe been okay with it if she was actually the seventeen-or-eighteen-ish(?) that she looked, but she’s not. She’s in her thirties and Vos is... what, twenty? Twenty-one? No.

He stares at her, and she wonders momentarily if she’d gone too far in the direction of judging his intentions in the Force and preempted actual flirtations.

“I’m sorry?” He offers, looking confused, but ashamed. “I, uh, I’ll keep that in mind.”

She definitely preempted the actual flirtation.

Fuck.

Ahsoka closes her eyes and breathes in. Breathes out. Opens her eyes. “Right. That was... I’m not sure how much Padawan Billaba told you about me.”

“Enough,” Tholme says. He moves forward and puts a hand on Quinlan’s shoulder. Ahsoka has no idea if it’s to comfort him or hold him back. “I didn’t share most of it with my padawan, but I have a general understanding of what’s going on.”

Quinlan darts a look at his teacher, but Ahsoka doesn’t acknowledge it. It’s fine. Everything is fine.

“Thank you for your understanding,” she says, and bows, and stiffly turns away to walk to the galley.

---------------------------

Leia squirms into the bench seat, shoving her way under Ahsoka’s arm like a particularly wriggly tooka.

“What was that?” Leia demands, the authority of a rebellion general rather useless in the squeaky voice of a child.

“What was what?”

“The whole thing with Padawan Vos,” Leia says. “You blew up at him before he even did anything.”

That’s pretty true.

“I felt the flirtation coming before it happened and reacted inappropriately because I panicked. I’m significantly older than him, but I can’t tell him that, so it’s just awkward and uncomfortable and... I’m not okay, Princess. I haven’t been for a long time.”

“Yeah, we can tell.”

“Leia.”

“What? I need therapy too! Captain Rex needs therapy! I’m pretty sure Fett needs therapy! You, Fulcrum, you really need therapy. None of us are okay.” She huffs, wiggling impossibly closer. “I don’t like it, but it’s true.”

“I know,” Ahsoka groans. “I just... I just need to hold out until the Temple.”

“Will you be able to hold it together if you see someone you actually care about?” Leia demands. “What are you going to do when you see Kenobi?”

“Stop.”

“I’m serious, you--”

“Leia, that’s enough,” she snaps. “I was fighting that war before you were even born, and I’ve dealt with the consequences since. I know the risks and I’ll thank you to remember who taught you to control your own mind.”

Leia stiffens, sucking in a sharp breath. “That was uncalled for.”

“You’re not the child you appear to be,” Ahsoka reminds her, not a little sharply. “You want to dish it out, be ready to take it. What will you do when we see Bail Organa? When we see the toddler that is Anakin Skywalker?”

“I get it.”

“I’m not sure you do,” Ahsoka mutters. She isn’t surprised when Leia ducks out of the embrace and leaves the galley. She lets the girl go, guilt warring with the memory of how Master Kenobi had more than once spoken that way to Anakin at the height of the war. The fact that she’s an adult in the body of a child isn’t an excuse for poking at Ahsoka’s open wounds. It was cruel and unnecessary, and unbecoming of a... not a Jedi. A princess. A politician.

She rests her head on her arms and zones out. She should meditate, but that seems like... too much effort.

She can feel Vos and Tholme setting up in the room they’ve been assigned. Neither seems particularly angry. Most likely, Tholme’s given the absolute shortest explanation of ‘child soldier, dead master, highly traumatized and emotionally unstable’ to Vos to smooth over the incident in the cargo hold. Rex is with Leia; he’s agitated, but less so than Leia herself. Fett’s annoyed, in the cockpit, but he seems annoyed as often as not. There’s a shudder at lift-off, and a few minutes later, they’re in hyperspace, headed for the Core.

Fett finds her, falls into the other bench in full armor, and drops his elbows onto the table. The helmet clunks down a moment later.

She doesn’t lift her head. “What do you want?”

“Do I need to keep Vos away from you?”

“What?”

“Vos. He made you uncomfortable. Was that him being someone that hurt you in the future, or just the interaction being awkward?”

She lifts her head. She stares at him. “What?”

He leans back and crosses his arms. “Do you need me to tell Vos to stay the hell away from you?”

She’s gaping. “You realize I’m thirty-two, right? I can handle my own battles.”

“You’re also traumatized as hell and everyone can see it,” Fett argues back. “If Vos himself is a trigger, I can handle it.”

“He’s not,” she tells him. This is strange. Fett’s being strange. “He was actually a friend of my grandmaster’s. I’m just uncomfortable with the flirting because I’m a lot older than he realizes, and I can’t tell him that.”

He nods sharply, and then looks away. The silence sits.

“Thanks for asking?” Ahsoka says, well aware of how her confusion over the offer turns it into a question. “I mean, thank you for... caring.”

I guess, she finishes in the privacy of her own head. Or at least pretending to.

Fett makes a face, still not facing her. He eyes the galley instead. She can guess where his thoughts are going. The galley is... not very big, especially with six people on board instead of one, but she’s sure they’ve stocked up enough. On the off chance they do go through more than expected, because of how many growing bodies are in residence, they can stop off and buy more. They have those resources now.

Jango never does ask what she did with the slavers.

“Who’s going to cry if I spice things properly?” he asks.

“Probably Leia,” she says immediately. “Vos will try to power through it even though he’s going to be overwhelmed. No idea about Tholme, but I think he’ll keep a straight face whether he likes it or not. Rex and I are fine, ‘hot’ was pretty much the only flavor of seasoning the GAR had.”

“GAR?”

“Grand Army of the Republic.”

He finally looks at her.

“You already knew I was a child soldier, Fett; don’t act surprised.”

“That doesn’t mean I like hearing about it.”

“I was fourteen. That’s old enough by Mando standards, Fett. Just think back, when did you get on the battlefield?”

“I take your point,” he says, lip curling unpleasantly. “It just hits different now that I’m old enough to look back and think of how damned young fourteen really is.”

Ahsoka shrugs. “Yeah, well--”

“You said the clones were ten.”

There’s the rub, isn’t it?

Of course it was about the clones.

“...closer to seven, by the end. Kamino was just making speedies at that point. Triple growth on the average instead of double, but averages in that case meant they’d been growing at double rates for six years and then got forced through four growth cycles in a single year to beef up the army when we kept losing men.” She looks down at the table, picking at a scratch in the plastipaint with her nail. “Rex and the rest of the ones from the beginning were basically twenty in mind and body, even if they’d only been decanted ten years earlier. The speedies... I always wondered. They’d gone from functionally twelve to functionally twenty in a year. That’s not... even in Kamino, that can’t have been normal. They didn’t act like adults, not the way the originals did.”

Fett rubs at his face, groaning. He swears under his breath in three different languages.

She pities him, if only because he hasn’t actually done any of this yet. He’s paying for the crimes of a man he likely won’t ever become.

She kicks him under the table. “Wanna make tiingilar and see how long it takes Vos to start crying while he insists it’s fine?”

---------------------------

Dinner is when the questions start. Some are relatively easy. Others, not so much.

“My Master was Leia’s biological father,” is an easy truth to share. “She inherited his power, so I need to get her to the temple for her own safety, because home no longer is.”

“Yes, her adoptive parents were unfortunately killed rather recently. We’d prefer not to talk about it.”

“Rex is with me. Where he goes, I go, and vice versa.”

That one gets her an odd look.

“I thought...” Quinlan trails off, gesturing between Rex and Fett.

Fett keeps his face impassive, but his discomfort and guilt leak into the Force. “I didn’t know Rex existed until I ran into these three in a spaceport cantina a few weeks ago.”

Quinlan blinks at him, looks at Rex again, and then turns back to Fett with a grin that might have been described as ‘saucy’ if he were less smug about it. “Wild oats, huh?”

“Are you shitting me right now,” Leia whispers, and Ahsoka elbows her.

“That was inappropriate, padawan.”

Quinlan’s grin fades as Fett just continues to eye him.

“Um, so--”

“How old is the kid?” Fett interrupts.

Darting eyes answer him, as Quinlan tries to gauge Rex. “Ten? Maybe twelve?”

“And how old am I?”

“...early thirties?”

“I’m twenty-seven.”

Quinlan’s grin fades further as he does the math.

“I’d have been between fifteen and seventeen when he was born,” Fett says, tone flat. “Between fourteen and sixteen at conception. I know damn well I wasn’t doing anything that could have resulted in a kid at that age.”

Quinlan rallies. “So, brothers?”

Tholme sighs loudly, hand over his eyes.

“I’m a clone,” Rex says, and Ahsoka can feel the amusement he gets out of Quinlan’s confused shock. They’d both had plenty of respect for Master Vos, but Padawan Vos was nothing but trouble. “Harvested genetic material, grown in a tube, inconsistent aging meaning I don’t even know how old I am for sure.”

“I broke him out,” Ahsoka adds, which is half true.

“There was a chip in my head,” Rex adds, with a bright smile. Quinlan’s discomfort grows. “She got it out. Also, lots of brothers. None of them are... around anymore. The creators were trying to make an army.”

Vos and Tholme have no response. Fett looks like he’s been carved out of stone. Leia’s just ignoring them and picking at her food.

Ahsoka lifts a hand and, without looking, Rex high-fives her.

---------------------------

“Drop your elbow.”

Ahsoka tries to cover her smile at the dirty look that Leia shoots Fett. Fett remains unimpressed by the glare of royalty, just gestures for the girl to do as he said.

“I know how to fight,” Leia grumbles. “I took lessons. I was good at them.”

“And I’m better,” Fett says, leaving no room for argument. “You want the Torrents to take over?”

The Torrents. Rex and Soka. She likes being referred to that way. Like they’re a team that never got split up.

Force, she wished they’d never gotten split up.

“Again,” Fett orders, and Leia moves through the Mandalorian kata with ill grace in her emotions and all grace in her sweeping limbs.

Well, as much grace as an undersized six-year-old can, at any rate.

“Think he’ll ask me to spar her again?” Rex asks, dropping down into the seat next to Ahsoka and passing her a drink.

“Maybe,” she acknowledges. “I think he’s wondering if it’s worth asking Vos to spar with her, so she gets more experience with size differences.”

“Hm?”

“She flinched at his face again,” she tells him. “The whole... thing with Boba, I guess. She still won’t tell me why Fett triggers her sometimes, but he’s not pressing her to spar with him, and there’s only so much she can get out of fighting me. Asking Tholme would be presumptuous, but Vos is just a padawan. I think it’d work out.”

“And you?”

She looks at him, already feeling a cresting wave of bullshit she doesn’t want to deal with. “What about me?”

“Are you going to spar with the Jedi?”

She should. She hasn’t sparred with a saber since she got tossed back into a body only half-familiar to her. She’s let Leia borrow the shorter one to learn some basic blocking moves, Shii-Cho and then, with hesitance, the first Soresu form. Another time, she loaned it to Rex to practice some attacks; they both know that the next time he picks up her saber in battle, having lost his weapons or she her grip, it will be neither the first or last time he wields a sword of light. None of that, however, is... sparring.

None of that is against someone who knows what they’re doing.

How long has it been since she sparred with anyone other than Kanan and Ezra?

How long has it been since she sparred without the looming specter of Darth Vader in the back of her mind, without fear of the Inquisitors, without the knowledge that any saber held by someone other than her two friends would be red as blood and twice as drenched.

Would she be able to hold back as she fought?

“I should,” she acknowledges, eyes on where Fett is nudging Leia’s feet into position for some kind of leveraging flip. She’s so small. “It would probably be a good idea to spar against a master at some point.”

“Do you think you can?” Rex asks.

“I never knew him,” she says. “And he isn’t Dark. It should be fine.”

Rex nods, taking her word for it. They watch as Leia stumbles on a final move, and Fett gestures for her to sit down and get a drink.

“That man is a terror,” she informs them.

(She’d once described him as a slave-driver. She had not made that mistake twice.)

“Least it’s not Kamino!” Rex tells her cheerfully. When Leia refuses to look impressed, he laughs at her.

Ahsoka has a half-second’s warning before heavy boots thud to the ground next to her. “What’s Kamino?”

“Hello, Vos, it’s nice to see you too,” she drawls. “I’m good, thanks for asking, and yourself?”

The boy-not-quite-man rolls his eyes. “Hi, Torrents; hi, tiny one.”

Leia glares at him next.

“So, Kamino?”

“Planet by Rishi,” Rex says.

“Why were you there?”

“They specialize in cloning.”

Ahsoka covers her mouth as the conversation drops into the same awkward gap that always happens when Quinlan stumbles into a subject he didn’t know to avoid.

“Like... you were made there, or you were researching how it works for your own--”

Ahsoka slaps a hand over his mouth. “Now’s a great time to stop talking.”

He licks her palm.

She bares her teeth and arches her fingers just enough to press nails into his cheek.

He bites at her palm, and she yanks her hand away.

“You’re all children,” Leia accuses, conveniently forgetting that Ahsoka and Rex are both over a decade older than her.

“I can throw you the length of a swimming pool,” Ahsoka tells her. “One of the fancy competition-ready ones that would make a Tatooinian cry. You are absolutely the child here.”

“Using the Force is cheating, sir,” Rex informs her.

“Only if there’s a competition,” Ahsoka shoots back. “And proving that a certain princess is a small child is not a competition. It’s a declarative fact.”

“I’m going to rip open the seams on all your tops except the ugliest one,” Leia decides.

“Try me,” Ahsoka challenges. “Adi’ka.”

A low, rough cough interrupts them. “Are you done?”

Fett has his arms crossed, and an eyebrow raised. He knows they’re all adults here, and is entirely unamused. As the silence drags, the eyebrow climbs a little higher.

“Done with what?” Quinlan finally asks, thereby volunteering himself to spar in hand-to-hand with Jango Fett, as one does.

“Poor, poor Vos,” Rex laughs, watching as Fett barks out orders at Quinlan every five seconds to fix his footwork, to stop dropping his guard, to stop wasting energy on flips instead of just dodging the easy way.

“Throw him!” Ahsoka calls. To her delight, Fett obliges.

The thing is, Quinlan isn’t bad at brawling. He’s got training, endurance, skill. The man knows what he’s doing, objectively. He’s just not a match for Fett, and is used enough to relying on his saber that his hand-to-hand skills are rusty. They are perhaps less rusty than those Jedi who don’t take questionable jobs in the Mid-Outer Rim, and Ahsoka’s got a suspicion that Vos regularly gets into bar fights in his downtime, but none of that is enough for him to actually do more than survive against Fett without his saber.

Even the saber wouldn’t help, if Fett had his armor.

“Whose idea was this?”

Ahsoka cranes her head back and smiles. “Hello, Master Tholme. Vos... volunteered.”

“Did he know he was volunteering?”

“No comment.”

Tholme snorts, crossing his arms and eyeing the spar in front of him. “I thought Fett hated Jedi. Giving us a ride for the sake of you three is one thing, but why is he teaching my padawan?”

Ahsoka shrugs. “Constructive bullying?”

There’s a small twitch of a smile, quickly gone. “He said something wrong, I’m guessing?”

“There was no way he could have known,” she dismisses. “We’re just, like, ninety-percent tragic backstories.”

“You’d think the Force would warn him,” Rex notes.

“That’s not how the Force works,” Leia chides.

“No, no, he’s right,” Ahsoka corrects. “The Force does sometimes step in to stop a person from saying something stupid. However, Padawan Vos is at an age where people think they are very rational while being more irrational than they likely ever will be again.”

“Do I want to ask what you were doing at that age?” Tholme asks.

“Running bla...” she trails off, then whips around to gape at him.

He smiles, bland and unassuming. “Does Fett know?”

“Know... what?” Ahsoka asks.

“That you’re significantly older than you look,” he says, voice just low enough that the sparring duo can’t hear him. “All three of you.”

Ahsoka turns back to the spar, only catching Tholme out of the corner of her eye. “He knows.”

“Mm. Were you planning on telling the Council?”

“Yes.” That part was never in question. “How did you figure it out?”

“I am a good investigator,” he says. “And you rely a little too heavily on your physical forms to obfuscate. Were it just one of you, that wouldn’t be a problem, but the pattern repeated across three is a little easier to discern.”

“I hoped the whole ‘child soldiers’ thing would be a bigger distraction,” Ahsoka mutters. She glances at Leia and Rex. Both of them are used to being in charge to some degree, giving orders and making contingency plans, but in this... in this, Ahsoka is in charge. They’d decided that at the very start. It didn’t matter that Rex had lived longer and had more experience, or that Leia had held the highest Rebellion rank of the three of them. Ahsoka had been agreed as leader, and they were relying on her.

They’re waiting on her orders. Stiff and unhappy, in Leia’s case, but they trust her.

“Will you be telling Vos?” She asks.

“No,” Tholme says. “Your secrets remain your own unless they endanger us, and I’ve a feeling they won’t be.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Rex jokes, smile not reaching his eyes. “I’ve been working with this family for too long to trust that trouble won’t find them around the next corner.”

“This family?” Tholme repeats.

“Sokari was telling the truth about her master being Leia’s biological father,” Rex says. He shrugs. “I worked with him, with his wife, with both of his kids, with his master and his padawan. All of them, to a one, are trouble magnets.”

“Ah, but that’s not the secret that’s putting us in danger,” Tholme points out. “Simply existence as a Jedi.”

Rex shrugs. “Fair enough. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, though.”

Ahsoka lurches to her feet, turning with a smile and dancing backward into the the stretch of empty cargo hold they used for such things. “A spar, Master Tholme?”

He looks past her, to Quinlan, and raises a brow. “Would you not prefer to spar with someone a little closer to your level first?”

She barks out a laugh. “Master Tholme, I’m afraid I’ve spent more of my life fighting to survive than having normal friendly spars. My style is more lethal than the average, and you’ve already seen what war’s done to my mind. I ask to spar with you because, if I lose control, if I slip in time or react on an instinct that isn’t appropriate, I trust that you’ll be more able to stop me than a senior padawan.”

He smiles. “Yes, I gathered as much. Still, better to ask. Shall we wait for them to finish up?”

Ahsoka shrugs, turns, and yells. “Clear the deck!”

Rex snorts behind her, and lowly mutters, “Sir, yes, sir.”

She smirks at him over her shoulder. “At ease, Captain.”

“That’s ‘Commander’ to you, I got promoted,” he sniffs, chin held high.

Heavy steps herald Fett’s arrival at their little group. “The hells are you doing?”

“I’m going to have a spar with a Jedi Master, and I want you and Vos to not get stabbed.”

“I’m not that easy to injure in an actual fight, let alone by accident,” Fett grouses. He looks up and over at Vos, who is already significantly taller, if a fair shot less built. “This one, on the other hand...”

“Hey!”

Ahsoka laughs and backs into the center of the cargo hold, drawing her sabers. “Don’t worry, Vos, I won’t play dirty. You’ll probably get your master back in one piece.”

He wrinkles his nose at her. “Getting a bit ahead of yourself there, aren’t you? He’s a Jedi Master and former Watchman. You’re... what, eighteen?”

Ahsoka raises a brow and activates her sabers, tapping the blades together and watching as more than one person winces. “Wanna bet on how long I last?”

“No,” he says immediately, stepping back to join Rex on the bench. “You’ve already blindsided me enough. I’m not dumb enough to fall for whatever you’ve got up your sleeve.”

“I don’t have sleeves.”

“Armwarmers-slash-greaves, then.”

“Greaves go on the legs, these are vambraces.”

He throws his hands up in the air. “I’m just going to stop talking now!”

“Good plan,” Leia snarks, and then literally hisses when Rex ruffles her hair.

Tholme lights his saber and sinks into an opening stance.

Ahsoka mirrors him.

---------------------------

She wins, but barely. She's had a few weeks to practice her forms, has sparred hands-only with Rex and Fett, but this is her first real try at using her sabers against a person, instead of a blaster or thin air, since she arrived in the past. She’s only mostly adjusted to her body.

But Tholme is a healer and a watchman, not a duelist. Ahsoka held her own against Ventress, against Grievous, against Maul when she was this age. Still adjusting to her body or not, her lineage is one of battle, and it bled true.

“You’re terrifying,” Quinlan tells her after they’re done, smiling like the sun as he hands her a towel. “Please never turn that on me.”

She laughs at him. “Would you believe that I’m out of practice?”

“Out of practice with what?” he asks, horrified and fascinated. “Fighting Sith Lords?”

“Among other things,” she says, and smirks when he chokes on his drink. “Multiple darkside users who claimed to be Sith, at least. One being a full Lord, one that was disowned by his master, and one that was apprenticed to a Banite apprentice, so she wasn’t technically allowed to be a Darth because of the rule of two.”

Tholme meets her eyes past Quinlan’s shoulder, head tilted and eyes half-shut in consideration. He’s taking her seriously. He knows what she’s not saying.

“How...” Quinlan trails off and shakes his head. “You know what, no. Asking you people questions never ends well.”

“Good plan,” Ahsoka says, clapping a hand down on his shoulder. “Also, you need to spar with Fett more. Your footwork is shit.”

“It is not,” Quinlan gripes. “You’re all just scary good at this stuff.”

“You mean surviving?” Leia pipes up, and smiles innocently when Quinlan turns to pout at her.

“You’re getting bullied by a six-year-old,” Rex informs him.

“Yeah,” Quinlan sighs. “I know.”

Ahsoka laughs, and it’s fine. It’s all fine. For a week, everything is honestly great. She trains, she laughs, she works through the nightmares.

Then fucking Denon happens.

---------------------------

Denon is a city-planet on the intersection of two major hyperlanes. It’s the kind of place where they stop for two things:

Fuel.

Paperwork.

Technically, there’s a whole mess of paperwork they have to fill out to continue along this specific hyperlane, since they aren’t official Republic ships, and don’t have the licenses to just pass along like ships that are pre-registered to the Trade Federation or the like. They could sneak past--literally all of them know smuggler’s routes--but it’s honestly less of a pain to do things legally. They have a Jedi Master. They have cash. Some of that cash wasn’t quite legally acquired, but nobody needs to know that.

It’s supposed to be a pit stop. That’s all.

It’s just a pit stop.

But no, the galaxy isn’t that kind and Ahsoka’s luck is currently being compounded with a Skywalker, two Fetts, and Vos, which means that of course they run into trouble. Of course they do. There was never any other option, was there?

“Motherfucker,” Ahsoka snaps, lifting her head up and slamming her drink on the table.

The glass is empty. That’s good. They’re in a restaurant right now, a little splurging after weeks with only each others’ company, and spilling the sugary child-friendly juice with that move would have drawn way too much attention from the servers.

“Language,” Tholme says, voice idly unconcerned.

“Sir?” Rex asks, kicking Ahsoka under the table. “What’s wrong?”

“What’s wr--that jackass,” she hisses, getting to her feet. “Rex, grab a blaster, I’ve got shebs to kick.”

“Okay,” Rex says, grabbing one out of Fett’s holster and scooting out of the booth before anyone can tell him not to. “Whose?”

“I didn’t even know that he was... osik, I don’t have jurisdiction,” she realizes. “I don’t have any record of wrongdoing. I can’t arrest him since we don’t have evidence of criminal wrongdoing...”

“Are you two going to explain what’s going on?” Vos asks. “Or sit down, maybe?”

Ahsoka makes her decision. She eyes the window--the restaurant in question is a little dingy, but it’s also several dozen stories in the air. “Rex, remember the thing we did on Geonosis that you hated?”

He pauses, and then sighs heavily. “Yes, sir. I remember the... yeeting.”

Hah. That slang doesn’t even exist yet.

“Great. With me!”

It’s a good thing the windows are forcefields instead of transparisteel. A bit of a twist to the energy and they’re gone.

She only hears a little screaming before the wind tears all noises away while they plummet.

They land lightly--of course--and Ahsoka wraps them both in a don’t notice me aura. Nobody even notices that they’ve just come from above. It’s great that she can just Do These Things again, and get brushed off as Weird Jedi Shit, instead of worrying about the Empire. She’s missed being able to jump out of windows without fear.

Rex follows her as she starts running through the city. They don’t have comms, and he’s still so small, which means he can’t keep up with her even if she runs at normal speeds without Force enhancement.

“Should you carry me?” he asks, before she can figure out if it’s worth suggesting. She did it a few times before they joined up with Jango.

“It’s not... urgent, I think,” she says. She hesitates to speak, even as she keeps jogging with Rex at her heels. “Honestly, I’m trying to figure out if there’s anything I can ding him for so we can attack him. It’s all well and good that I can beat him right now, but all the crimes I know about haven’t happened yet, so it wouldn’t be legal...”

“Commander?”

“Hm?”

“I have no idea who you’re talking about.”

She scrolls the conversation back mentally, considers, and says, “Oh.”

“Who’s getting steamrolled?”

“Uh, Maul’s here,” Ahsoka admits.

“Ah,” Rex says. He makes a face. “I understand the desire to jump out a window, now. I don’t agree with it, but I understand.”

Ahsoka laughs. “I mean, I just... every time I’ve seen him for almost twenty years, it’s been like... on sight, you know? We’ve never not attacked each other, except when I needed him to cause problems on Mandalore. But I always knew I was in the right, then.”

“So... what do we arrest him for?” Rex prompts.

“Um... carrying a lightsaber without a license?” she hazards. “We’ll need Tholme there. Hopefully I can just shout at him and he’ll attack me, but I think he only went full nutjob after Master Kenobi cut his legs off. He might be too controlled to try to kill me just for yelling at him.”

“...do we have to stalk him?” Rex asks, sounding like he’d most likely sigh if he weren’t mid-run.

She scoops him up and swings him around onto her back before she answers. “I think we have to stalk him, Rex’ika.”

“Don’t call me that.”

---------------------------

Maul is... exceptionally sneaky, actually. Either that, or he hasn’t done anything wrong yet. Ahsoka’s betting on the former, because she’s seen this particular skocha kung take over a planet before anyone realized he was the most dangerous person around.

Or maybe he’s just not committing crimes, and is in fact just here to buy groceries.

He’s examining a papaya.

She fantasizes about jumping across the market and greeting him with a heel to the cheekbone.

“Are you imagining a flying kick, Sir?”

“Yeah...”

“He’s examining a papaya, Sir.”

“I know...”

“Does he know we’re here?”

“I don’t know. Maybe? Do you think I should go hit him?”

“No.”

“Should I hit on him?”

“No, Sir. I would not advise that.”

“He’s looking at the neloms.”

“I can see that.”

“Why does he have to be so bo--did he just fucking bite a nelom?”

“It appears so, Sir.”

“Like... like rind and all. Just bit the little fucker.”

“Seems it.”

A scuff of metal. “What the fuck are you two doing?”

Ahsoka tips her head around to peer through the grate. “We’re spying, Fett, what does it look like we’re doing?”

Rex cranes his head. “We’re hanging upside-down from a fire escape to get a look at a suspected Sith Apprentice that is currently shopping for various fruits, Mand’alor.”

Ahsoka waves. “Hi, Master Tholme.”

“Sokari,” the master greets. “This seems a very conspicuous way to spy.”

She shrugs as well as she can from this angle. “Yes, but you see, this way’s more fun.”

“Is it now.”

Rex shifted. “He’s on the move!”

“To kill someone?!”

“No, to the deli meats.”

“Kriff.”

---------------------------

Apparently, Tholme and Fett had told Quinlan to take care of Leia, as Leia had wanted to finish her juice and refused to get involved in the Torrents’ nonsense. According to her, if they couldn’t be bothered to explain the nonsense, they didn’t need her.

This was true and accurate.

Quinlan shows up while they’re still stalking Maul, having moved to a low rooftop for a decent vantage point with less likelihood of being spotted. He’s giving Leia an eopie-back ride, and the pout on her face at needing it is adorable. She pouts harder when she sees them.

“Are you even trying to hide?” Leia scoffs.

“Not really,” Ahsoka admits. She’s got Fett’s binoculars out. “I’m not sure he’s caught wind of the fact that we’re here yet.”

“Or he has and he’s just biding his time to escape while we’re distracted,” Tholme points out.

“Meh,” Ahsoka says, avidly devouring the visual that is a teenage Maul glaring at leafy vegetables. “I just want him to do something so I have an excuse to beat his ass.”

“Do I get to know who?” Quinlan asks, setting Leia down on the roof. “Or are we going to keep being completely unwilling to share information?”

“Baby Sith Lord,” Ahsoka says. “He’s fifteen. A child.”

“A baby,” Rex agrees.

“You’re... that’s... ugh,” Quinlan groans as loudly and as dramatically as he dares, flopping down to the rooftop. “Master Tholme, please tell me this isn’t a real Sith.”

“He’s Dark,” Tholme confirms. “Sith is... up for debate until we have evidence.”

“He’s a bitch is what he is,” Ahsoka mutters. She observes the teenager in question stop to poke at some pink tomatoes. “E chu ta, break the law, already!”

“Does he have a lightsaber?” Quinlan asks. “If he has a lightsaber and no Jedi ID or specialty license, we can probably arrest him.”

“Auntie Soka doesn’t have a license or ID,” Leia points out.

“She’s got a Jedi escort,” Tholme says. “And if our supposed Sith is polite and plays nice, we can probably escort him to the Temple as well.”

Rex snorts derisively.

“Do you know why he’s on Denon?” Fett asks.

“No clue,” Ahsoka admits. “Evil reasons, probably.”

“You’re useless,” Leia tells her.

“Thanks, princess, how’s that attempt to open the jam jar by yourself coming?”

Leia says something very inappropriate for a princess, for a child, and for a lady. It’s fairly appropriate for a soldier, which is admittedly what she’s been for a few years now. Ahsoka sticks her tongue out at the girl like the mature operative she is.

“I wish we could still get him to lose his osik by just showing up and insulting him,” Rex mutters, low enough that Quinlan probably can’t hear.

“I wanna punch him in the face,” Ahsoka confesses. “I want him to try to punch me in the face, and fail.”

“Don’t bully the baby Sith,” Rex admonishes.

“He’s a Sith.”

“He’s fifteen, it’s tacky.”

“But it’s Maul.”

“I know, but you’re tw--significantly older than him.”

“But... but it’s the motherfucker himself.”

“...you can bully him a little, but only because he’s a Sith.”

Fett steals the binoculars. “You can borrow them again when you stop acting like children.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Rex says, dry as Ryloth. “I’m ten.”

“Pretty tall for your age,” Ahsoka mutters, and then giggles.

“Don’t steal my jokes,” Rex says. He elbows her, hard.

“You know,” Quinlan says, slow and tired. “Master Tholme and I are trained investigators.”

Ahsoka and Rex look at each other, and then up at him.

“Okay?”

“...do you want me to find actual evidence of this guy doing something criminal?”

“Oh, yes please.”

---------------------------

Quinlan, as it turns out, is not overselling his skills. He does catch Maul doing something illegal later that day. It’s a little more ‘stealing corporate secrets in the dead of night’ and less ‘torturing people for kicks,’ but it’s still enough to legally arrest him. Quinlan attempts to do so.

Quinlan does not succeed, and is forced to jump out a window to avoid getting cut in half. Maul follows, steals a passing speeder by throwing out the driver, and takes off. Someone--looks like Tholme--drops back to save the driver, but the rest of them give chase. Ahsoka gleefully takes point on that, of course. She’s the best pilot.

(Rex looks bored, but someone is likely to puke by the end of the night. She hopes it’s not Leia, who insisted on coming for some fucking reason.)

“How the kriff is a teenager that good?!” Quinlan yells, clinging to the edge of the speeder to avoid getting tipped out as Ahsoka swerves around a corner with a wild laugh.

“He’s a Sith!” Leia shouts over the wind. “What do you think?”

Quinlan is not impressed by the claim of Sith.

Ahsoka screeches as she drifts across four lanes of traffic and into an alleyway to pursue Maul. He’s pretty good at dodging cross-building walkways, but she’s better. She bares her teeth, hissing, and tries to pick a plan.

“Vos, how’s your aim with Force throws?” She calls to the backseat.

“Uh, decent?”

“Great! Fett’s the projectile!”

Vos takes a second longer to process that than Jango does.

“I’m wh--”

He cuts off, screaming, and is flung forward by Quinlan to crash headfirst into a teenage Sith.

“Take the wheel!” Ahsoka commands, not waiting to see who follows the order, because Fett and Maul are both getting to their feet, the other speeder is about to crash, and she’s not sure who’s going to win that fight.

She jumps from the speeder they’ve been violently dragging around Denon, and lands feet-first on Maul’s... shoulder.

Hm.

That definitely dislocated something.

“You should wear armor!” she chirps at him, drawing both sabers and grinning as he whirls to face her, eyes wide with hate.

He’s utterly silent.

That’s disturbing. Expected, but disturbing.

“Did you just throw me?” Fett demands, higher pitched than she’d normally expect.

“No, Vos threw you.”

“Because you told him to!”

“Yeah, it’s a good strategy!”

“It is not!”

“Why not? Throwing people was standard practice in the GAR.”

She can’t see his face, but she’s pretty sure he’s about ready to strangle her.

Ahsoka cannot, at that point, continue snarking with the father of her best friend, because there’s a red lightsaber coming for her throat, and she should probably worry about that. Maul’s very good at killing people and she’d like to avoid becoming part of that statistic.

As she is quickly reminded, he is... fifteen. And shorter than she’s used to. And already injured.

It’s really, really easy to take him out, actually.

At some point, the other speeder was safely recovered before it caused property damage, and their own is landing a few meters away with Vos and the kids.

“You have Force-negating cuffs, right?” Ahsoka asks.

“No, Master Tholme has them.”

“Oh,” she says, and grimaces. “I guess I’ll just... keep sitting on him then.”

Maul snarls, and she raps him on the skull. “Stop that, it’s uncivilized.”

Rex snorts.

Jango makes a noise that is incredibly frustrated with the lot of them, and turns on Rex. “Was she telling the truth?”

“About?”

“Throwing people being standard practice for the GAR.”

Rex’s face goes pained. “It was in the five-oh-first. And a few others.”

“What’s the GAR?” Quinlan asks.

“None of your damn business,” Fett snaps.

Quinlan throws his hands up in the air again. “Come on! I just proved I know what I’m doing!”

“And their tragic backstory is none of your business, prudii!”

Quinlan blinks at him, and then glances at Ahsoka. “Um.”

“He called you a shadow since your training, um, seems to be pointing in that direction,” she says as carefully as she can. “We were theorizing.”

“Wh... you actually paid attention?” Quinlan asks, looking horribly confused. “I thought I was just annoying you.”

Ahsoka laughs at him. “Oh, Vos... I’ve been running black ops for... much longer than most would guess. Trust me, I know another spy when I see them.”

She smiles as kindly as she can, because she hadn’t actually meant to make him feel left out or unwanted or... well, she’d been pretty patronizing, especially for someone seemingly younger than him. The smile does not work. Quinlan just looks kind of horrified about how young she just implied she started spy work.

Granted, she’d been sixteen for Zygerria...

Deciding to ignore him for a bit, she shifts on Maul’s back and pats him on the cheek. “Don’t worry, Baby Sith. We’re going to get you lots of nice therapy. Mind healers, no Sith tortures, all that fun stuff. Maybe some plushies.”

“You’re also getting therapy, right?” Quinlan asks. “Please say you are. I’m required for the specifics of my training and if anything you’ve said is true, I feel like you really need it and I’m scared of what’ll happen if you don’t.”

Ahsoka laughs, knowing exactly how empty it sounds. “Oh hell, if I didn’t get therapy, I imagine Kix would rise from the grave to force me into it.”

The name means nothing to anyone except Rex, and... ah, yeah, she told Fett about Kix a few weeks ago.

“No more throwing me without warning,” Fett grumbles, dropping to sit on the ground next to her. “Especially not at baby Sith Lords.”

“I am not a child!” Maul spits.

“He speaks!” Ahsoka cheers. “Aw, I knew you could do it.”

“’Soka, I told you not to bully him,” Rex complains. “It’s tacky. You’re being tacky.”

“I’m allowed to be tacky,” Ahsoka declares. “I’ve died twice, that’s, like, permission from the universe.”

“You’ve died twice?” Quinlan asks, back in ‘fascinated horror’ territory. “Wait, no, I shouldn’t ask--”

“Too late! The first time was on a planet that doesn’t exist and my Master lost his mind, killed a god, and used the good favor of another god to have me brought back to life at her expense. Not in that order.”

“I--what? No, that’s--what?”

Ahsoka smiles brightly. “You asked.”

Tholme finally shows up with the cuffs.

---------------------------

“You should eat something.”

He glares at her.

“Baby Sith Lords need to eat.”

He keeps glaring at her.

“Maul, you’ll never get big and strong and ready to kill if you don’t eat your vegetables.”

He bares his teeth.

“No, I don’t eat my veggies, but I’m a Togruta, so if I eat too many vegetables I throw up.”

Rex kicks her thigh, right on the faulds. “What did I say about bullying the Sith Lord?”

“Not to.”

“And what are you doing?”

“Making him eat his vegetables.”

“Soka.”

“Rex’ika.”

He kicks at her again. “Get up, we’re swapping out the watch.”

“But I wanted to hang out with my favorite little criminal mastermind.”

Rex drops to the floor and presses his forehead to her shoulder. “How the hell is being around this guy the first thing to make you cheer up in weeks?”

“I’m allowed to be mean to him.”

“He’s going to bite you.”

“I’ll bite back.”

Rex jabs a finger into her ribs, and she squeaks. “Go get something to eat, Commander.”

“Fine,” she huffs, rolling to her feet and moseying along to the galley. She walks in on Tholme and Fett having an argument about the ways in which Jedi and Mandalorians differ. Quinlan’s on the side, watching with wide eyes, and little Leia’s drinking a juice box at his side, tucked up under his arm and occasionally saying things to fan the flames. Ahsoka assumes she’s enjoying herself.

She opens the cooling unit, looks over the contents, and pulls out a raw leg of eopie mutton. She leans against the counter, bites into the chilled-but-not-frozen meat, and uses the back of one hand to wipe the blood off her chin. The ‘real adults’ don’t notice.

“I’m like ninety percent sure you’re doing this to mess with me but also...” Quinlan trails off, staring at her with horror. “Why?”

“A girl’s gotta eat.”

“Yeah, but all the obligate carnivores I know are like... generally holding to basic rules of courtesy when it comes to not grossing people out,” Quinlan says. “Like, I don’t chew with my mouth open. You don’t... eat in the most intimidating--did you just crack the bone with your teeth?!”

Ahsoka smirks at him, using her free hand to take away the shard of bone so she can suck out the marrow without eating the bones themselves. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this isn’t polite society. We’re in a galley on a bounty hunter’s ship, and I’ve been living on the run or in an army for most of my life. Table manners are optional.”

“No, they’re not,” Leia orders. “Fett, it’s your ship, tell her to--”

“--and another thing!” Fett snaps at Tholme, clearly paying less than no attention to the food argument.

Ahsoka keeps on eating, trying to catch wind of where the discussion’s at. Mostly, it seems to be at ‘talking past each other.’ Neither of them seems to have fully grasped more than the absolute most basic parts of the other culture, and that’s only enough to insult each other, not actually have a constructive conversation. She’d have expected more out of Tholme, at least. He’s not exactly young.

“Hey, quick question,” she says, in a moment where both of them have paused for breath and the opportunity to seethe. “Fett, when’s the last time you worked with a Jedi, or any member of a Force-based religion, before I popped into your life?”

His nose scrunches up as he makes a face.

“And Tholme, when’s the last time you worked with anyone from the Mandalorian system?”

Tholme’s reaction isn’t any more gracious than Fett’s.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” she says. “Vos, were either of them actually interested in that conversation, or just looking for an excuse to yell?”

“Now listen here, jetiika--”

“Fett,” she snaps. “I am not a child.”

“And neither am I,” he growls right back. “This is my ship, and I damn well don’t need you treating me like a misbehaving youngling. You’ve got a problem, you bring it to my face, not get all smug about people’s tempers blowing over.”

Well, then.

She smiles thinly. “Of course.”

He stands with his arms crossed, in full armor save for the helmet. She puts aside the eopie meat and wipes her hands, smiling until she can put her hands on her hips and let it drop to a challenge.

“You know, I’m just--I’m just gonna go,” Quinlan mutters, pulling Leia out with him, the girl hanging from under one of his arms. “This, uh, this looks like a problem for... you folks. Um. Yeah.”

He sidles out.

Tholme doesn’t.

Fett rubs at the bridge of his nose, and then gestures at the table. “Sit.”

“I’d prefer not to.”

He drops his hand and glares at her. “We have another week on this ship together. We are going to have this conversation. Sit.”

She sits, right on the warm spot left behind by Quinlan and Leia. She crosses her arms, lifts a brow, and waits.

Fett takes the seat across from her. Tholme leans against the counter.

“We all know you’re older than you look,” Fett says. “I heard Tholme mention it, I know that much has been shared. You’re acting like an actual teenager, and I’ve... I’ve put up with a lot. I am trying to keep things civil, particularly with you. I’ve tried to be friendly. You’ve been fucked up since we met, fine, everyone’s got trauma. The thing where you’ve started talking shit to our faces for what seems like your own amusement? That has to stop. You’re older than me, Torrent. Fucking act like it.”

She blinks at him, slow and not exactly happy, and turns to Tholme.

The man shrugs. “I was planning to put up with it until we arrived to the temple and handed you over to some mind healers. Fett doesn’t have that kind of time.”

There’s a curdle in her stomach, defensive and angry and guilty.

“You’ve been... a bitch,” Fett finally says. “You know that. I’m not going to mince words. You’ve been holier-than-thou and rude and condescending, and aiming that at Antilles is one thing, when you’ve apparently known her since she was a toddler and taught her things. Aiming at the rest of us isn’t going to fly. We’re all adults trying to share a space. Stop acting like... just like you have been.”

There is no defense to be made that they aren’t both already aware of.

She closes her eyes and tries to strangle the burst of irrational rage.

Their accusations aren’t unfounded.

They deserve an apology.

She is in the wrong.

She’s felt freer than she had in years, and in that freedom allowed herself too much rein, let herself lace her words with barbed wires and poison instead of sparks and spices, comments that were cruel instead of just joking. Too familiar. Too comfortable.

“My behavior’s been inappropriate,” she finally says, the words clumsy and too big in her mouth. “You’re right about that. I’m sorry, and I’ll endeavor to keep a tighter rein on my less pleasant behaviors in the future.”

At least she only lashes out with words. It could be worse.

She opens her eyes, fixes her gaze on the wall behind Fett, wrestles her expression into stiff neutrality. “Am I dismissed?”

“...uh, no, not after that,” Fett says, sounding just a little horrified. “What the hell was that?”

Tholme hisses out a breath. “Let her go.”

“No, this needs to be discussed, that’s not a healthy rea--”

“Fett, let her go,” Tholme insists, low and heavy.

Fett looks between the two for a moment, seems to come to a realization he doesn’t like, and then gestures almost violently towards the door. “Fine. Go.”

She walks out, doesn’t sprint. She’s stiff. She’s controlled. She’s the one that fucked up, so it’s fine if she doesn’t feel great right now. Getting called out on one’s own failings as a person isn’t something to get upset about if the failings are real. The feelings are real and normal, but this was her fault, and so it’s up to her to fix it, and she can’t let them know it hurt her, because this was her mistake.

She goes to the cargo hold.

---------------------------

Ahsoka works out her frustrations on Fett’s punching bag. She does not augment herself with the Force, just uses raw strength and technique, ignoring the tears that press at her eyes.

She’s fine.

It’s not weird. It’s not odd. It’s not strange to not notice she’s been kind of a bitch since her mood came up with the whole Depa thing, and then Maul. She’s been mean, mostly to Vos and Fett, and nobody’s confronted her about it until now. They let her have room for her trauma, and she hadn’t reined it in. She’s just gotten worse.

‘Snippy’ she’d always been, but age apparently hadn’t fucking tempered it.

“Um.”

She catches the punching bag, breathing heavily and covered in sweat. She hasn’t worked out all the twitchy, nervous energy yet.

“Vos,” she greets, once she’s caught herself enough that her voice won’t waver. He’s on the other side of the bag, but she knows his voice. “Do you need something?”

“You’re kind of... projecting,” he tells her, drifting to where she can actually see him. “Not self-loathing, but, um, recrimination? You just don’t feel very good and I was hoping to help”

Why in all the Sith hells does he have to be nice.

“I got called out on my behavior and wasn’t ready to face the fact that I’d kriffed up,” she tells him. “I’ll be fine. And I’m... sorry. I haven’t been fair to you and was using you as an easy target for some of my ruder comments.”

“I mean, I kind of figured,” he admits, coming closer. “I’ve been tutored by Shadows before, and a lot of them act like you. I just assumed it was more of that.”

“I still shouldn’t have let myself run loose like that,” she says. “I’m... it wasn’t appropriate. I shouldn’t have let it happen.”

He shrugs, not meeting her eyes. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” she says. “Not with... not with you. Or anyone other than Rex and a mind healer, really. Most of it is...”

She trails off, distantly noticing that her eyes are tearing up enough to blur her vision, and her nails are digging into the bag in a way Fett won’t appreciate.

There’s so much that beat her down, never quite breaking her, that she doesn’t even know what made her act the way she does.

“Want to spar?”

She looks over at him, wonders what he sees that makes him want to fight her when she’s visibly unstable.

He smiles, kind and easy, and it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. It’s genuine in intent, if not in energy. He wants to help. “You all keep saying I could work on my hand-to-hand. Just take off the armor so I don’t break a finger, maybe.”

“You’re serious.”

“No, I’m Quinlan.”

She’s going to wipe the floor with this boy. “You sure you wanna fight me?”

“You won’t be able to meditate until you do,” he says. He’s right, damn him. “The other option is that I go get your... vod, I think? I go get Rex and you two can talk it out since you trust him with more. I don’t want to do that, though, he’s still a kid.”

She eyes him, lips pressed together and mind awhirl with emotions and thoughts she’d tried to beat out of her head and into the bag. “Ever fought someone without the Force?”

“...yes?”

“Was it cuffs?”

“Oh, you meant me not having the Force,” he realizes. “Er, no. Is... is that something you’ve done a lot?”

She smiles at him. “You’re planning on Shadow work. That means getting captured and stripped of everything you are at some point, Force included. Unfortunately, the cuffs are in use on a very annoying Dathomirian right now, so we’ll have to make do with you shielding like your mind’s a Kessel Spice Mine.”

“...do I want to know how often you’ve been captured?”

“No, you don’t.”

When he comes at her, it’s easy to dodge. It’s easy to tap him on target points, little pokes that show she could take him out, but isn’t going to until he’s learned something. He stays grinning throughout, letting her take the lead, and he treats her like... like a knight. Like a teacher. He’s stepped back and gone from trying to impress her as a fellow padawan, to proving himself to a full knight.

She’s not sure when that change happened, or why or how, but it makes things much smoother. She wants to think that it would have even if she hadn’t gotten a wakeup call from Fett.

So she treats him the way she treated Ezra, for the year she’d spent traveling with Kanan. She treats him as a student that’s willing to learn, good but not yet great, competent but not yet ready to survive. She draws him into the kind of chest-heaving exhaustion that tells a fighter just how much energy they waste.

(Ahsoka may have had her own style, but her grandmaster had been the pinnacle of a Soresu user. She’d spent years on the frontlines of a war. She knew the worth of conserving energy, and she’d teach it to any who stepped in to challenge her.)

“Who taught you to fight like this?” He asks, when they’ve taken a handful of moments to circle each other. His steps are heavy, sure, planted. Her own are light and ready.

“Soldiers,” she says. It’s true enough.

“Not your Master?” he asks, just as he tries to kick for her upper arm. It’s a safe question. For anyone else, it would be a safe question.

But for Ahsoka, it’s another chink in the armor, after a maelstrom of emotion, a storm of self-loathing, a dervish of instability.

She doesn’t break right away.

She spirals. She fights Quinlan, but doesn’t quite see him. Her strikes get sloppy, her feet stumble. She can’t make herself meet Quinlan’s eyes, not when the scrape of his heel against the metal sounds like the rasp of a breathing machine. Her shields get fuzzy, she knows, and she leaks what she feels into the air, making it sour and thick. She doesn’t notice, because all she can see, all she can--all she can hear and feel and--

She drops to her knees and grabs at her head, trying to stop it.

“Sokari?”

She breathes. In and out, harsh and jagged but natural in a way that the damned respirator wasn’t.

Her master her teacher her brother the traitor the hound the executioner

Her face is hot. Something prickles. It might be tears.

She tries to say something, tries to say a name or a request, tries to make anything come out of her mouth that isn’t the broken wail of a woman who hasn’t let herself think about how she died.

She feels herself pulled into someone’s arms, and she can’t quite tell who, but they’re bigger than she is, and feel warm and worried. They care. They don’t understand, they’re scared, but they care.

Her hands shake, clutched to her chest and she can’t breathe she can’t make herself take in enough air to do a Force-damned thing the empire is going to feel her her shields are down and broken and her emotions are spilling and the empire is going to find HER ANAKIN IS GOING TO FIND HER AND--

“COMMANDER!”

Rex.

Rex is here.

Her breath is coming so fast that she’s hiccupping more than she’s actually inhaling. She feels small hands in gloves on either side of her face, and then her forehead presses to something warm.

Rex. A Keldabe kiss. Her brother, her partner, her other half. He’s here. He’s calm. If he’s calm, then things are fine.

“What happened?” Light voice, high voice, small and distant. Leia. Little Leia little princess Leia she’s in danger she’s in trouble Anakin will--

“Commander.”

No. Here and now. She needs to focus on here and now. Her throat feels cold. She breathes too fast, still. She can’t stop it.

“I don’t know.” That’s Vos. He was... they were doing something. He was here. Talking to her. “We were sparring, and she just--”

Right, sparring.

“I don’t know if I said something?” He offers, voice pitching up, unsure and worried. Is he the one holding her? He’s the one holding her. That’s embarrassing.

“Commander?” Rex prompts. “Commander, can you open your eyes?”

She tries. She can’t. She shakes her head.

“Soka?” he asks, voice quiet. “Where are you?”

“F-F-Fett,” she manages. It’s enough.

“And where were you?”

His voice is so soft. So worried. She held him the same way after Mandalore, after Order 66, after all his brothers, all her friends...

“Soka.”

Her mind is spinning, and suddenly all she can hear is Anakin Skywalker is dead. I destroyed him.

Her breath hitches, and she wails.

“Commander,” Rex tries again, but her head is a vortex of Then you will die and Perhaps this child and not the Jedi way.

Our long awaited meeting.

I destroyed him.

Then you will die.

She can’t breathe she can’t breathe she can only see that yellow eye that’s too familiar but belongs to a stranger can only hear a voice that shouldn’t exist can only mourn and break and--

“Soka?”

“Malachor,” she manages. “I--h-he--I died.”

“What did you say?” someone asks. A vod. It’s the right voice, almost, rough and business-like, not accusing anyone yet, and... and... no. No. Not one of her boys. It’s Fett.

“Um, right at the end? I asked her who taught her to fight like this,” Quinlan says, nervous. “And she said it was soldiers. And I joked, I asked that it wasn’t her Master, and she didn’t answer that. A couple minutes later, she just started...”

“Oh, Soka,” Rex whispers, pulling her closer. “Commander, just breathe with me.”

“H-h-he, he just--R-Rex, he j-just--and I c-c-couldn’t--”

“I know,” her captain whispers. “I know, just breathe with me.”

“He k-k-k-killed me,” she sobs, falling out of the Keldabe and into too-small arms. “I l-loved--he was my broth-ther and--and he just--he killed me, he didn’t even stop.”

“I know,” Rex whispers. “Soka, I know.”

Of course he does.

---------------------------

“It was just bad timing,” Rex says, once they’re in the room she’s been sharing with her little family, curled up under a blanket and watching the floor like it has all the secrets to how she lost her world three times over.

“Is there anything we need to keep in mind?” Fett asks, gruff and uncomfortable. She wonders if he’s angry that she took his necessary confrontation and turned it into this mess.

“Don’t bring up her Jedi Master,” Rex says, and pulls her in when she shivers. Her eyes squeeze shut before she can stop them, tears beading up again. “Just... don’t. It’s too soon.”

“He’s--”

“He Fell,” Ahsoka interrupts. “I thought he died, but he became a Sith. And fifteen years later, we ran into each other, and I refused to join him in the Dark, so he tried to kill me.”

Fett swears, low and muffled. She thinks he has a hand over his mouth.

Quin and Leia aren’t there. She thinks they’re keeping an eye on their Baby Sith prisoner. That’s good.

“Soka,” Rex whispers, and she buries her face in his shoulder. She’s too old to be this kind of mess. She’s thirty-two. She’s Fulcrum. She’s...

She’s in need of a lot of therapy.

“We can avoid the subject unless you bring it up,” Tholme promises. “Definitely until the Temple. Is there anything else we shouldn’t talk about?”

Ahsoka can practically feel Rex’s deadpan look. “Sir, we’re a trio of child soldiers ripped from everything we know. Every other sentence is a risk. We’re just... working our way through.”

There’s a knock at the door. Oh. Quin and Leia.

“Just figured we’d drop this off before we went down to visit Mr. Grumpy-Face,” Quinlan whispers. He still thinks Leia’s a child. He’s trying to make things less terrible for her. That’s nice. “We decided he’ll be less angry if he tries Hoth chocolate, and made some for everyone.”

They definitely made it for Ahsoka herself, and Maul was an afterthought. Still. It’s sweet.

“Commander?” Rex prompts, jostling her a little to try and get her to sit up.

“Gimme a sec,” she manages. It takes longer than it should to push herself away from him, to accept the mug that Leia gives her, too-serious worry in the furrow of her brow and the twist of her soul.

She doesn’t look six. She doesn’t even look twenty-two. This girl was always too old for her skin, forced to grow up in the hostile fear of the Empire.

“Thank you, Princess.”

She sips.

She can barely taste it beyond the ashes she imagines coating her tongue.

I destroyed him, her memory echoes. His slightest hesitation before he made the final move, it haunts her. She almost reached him. If only she’d tried harder, yelled louder, been better...

She shivers.

“Do you need help falling asleep?” Tholme asks. “I’m a regular healer, not a mind healer, but...”

She probably should.

She takes another sip of her drink, willing herself to taste it. It’s good. She likes it. She knows she does.

“Can you make it dreamless?” she whispers.

“It doesn’t always work, but I can try,” he tells her.

She nods. “When I finish the chocolate.”

“Of course.”

---------------------------

Everyone’s careful around her for days. The whole decision to be nicer doesn’t mean anything when she’s walking about in a daze of too few emotions, drained of everything she could feel in favor of a grey cloud of fluff in everything she does.

She does forms. Single saber and Jar’kai. Ataru and Djem so and Soresu. Reverse grip, regular grip, partial reverse on either side.

Again. Again. Again.

She loses herself in the motions, not meditating so much as just empty.

Rex worries. Fett worries. Vos worries.

Leia and Tholme keep their shields locked up tight, and she doesn’t know how they feel. She thinks Leia might be judging her. She think Tholme might be pitying.

Maul simply hates. It’s an old and familiar sensation to walk into, and she takes unthinking comfort in his rage. She’s silent instead of snippy, when she plays the role of guard, and they stare at each other in silence. His eyes burn, and she wonders how much he’s heard of her nightmares.

“You need to talk,” Rex tells her, when he finds her with a cold cup of caff, eyes fixed somewhere beyond it all. She lifts her head. “Soka.”

She just stares at him.

He sighs and pulls her into a hug. “Commander, please.”

She can’t.

Ahsoka stares at the wall behind him, resting her chin on his head. Her neck itches under the lek at the back of her head, a little tingle of a feeling that she can’t bring herself to do anything about. The pale light of the galley is sharp against the chipped paint of the metal that surrounds them. It hurts her eyes to look, but it’s not the deep and dark lit only by red--

Then you will die, her memory growls.

She flinches.

“Breathe,” Rex tells her, too-small hands clinging at her back. “Just breathe, ‘Soka.”

She curls in tighter and tries to just breathe.

---------------------------

“Tell me something good.”

Ahsoka blinks. She looks at Leia. She doesn’t have the energy to parse that.

Leia chances a look at Rex, who isn’t leaving Ahsoka’s side any more than he has to, and Fett on the other side. Tholme’s asleep and Quin’s on Baby Sith duty. It’s just people who know, right now.

The little girl across the table, the child senator, the spy, purses her lips and huffs in irritation. “You knew my biological father before he became one of the worst people in the galaxy. Both of you did. Tell me something good about him.”

Good things.

About Anakin.

“You fought a war as a Jedi,” Leia prompts. “Surely you must have done some good things with him, or at least thought you were.”

Did they?

Every mission ended in tragedy or was just a ploy of Palpatine’s. Every saved life was just...

Wait.

“He built Threepio,” she finally says. “Your father wi--I mean, Bail wiped Threepio’s memory after the Empire rose, for your safety, but Anakin was the one who built him.”

Leia sits up, eyes brighter. “I didn’t know that. I... was Artoo involved? Did he build R2D2, or...”

“No,” Rex says, “But Artoo was his favorite astromech, and they always pushed each other into stupid stunts. We risked a hell of a lot to save that droid, more than once, and I didn’t find out until you started working with the Rebellion full-time, but Artoo and Threepio were the witnesses for your bio-parents’ wedding.”

Leia gapes at him. So does Ahsoka. (Fett doesn’t know enough to care.)

Rex grins, and if it looks a little forced, that’s fine. “He had a holo recording. I was one of the few people left that knew about the marriage that might have wanted to see, so Artoo offered. It was... sweet.”

He waits, probably for Ahsoka to add something herself, but she has nothing.

“I think that’s when they swapped droids, since Threepio was more useful to a politician and Artoo did his best work when we set him loose on the enemy.”

“He never changed,” Leia muses. “Did he always swear that much?”

“Yes,” Ahsoka answers, as Rex laughs. “Always. All the binary I learned started with the best swears.”

She tries to think of another good memory, something else that Leia might appreciate. Her mind ticks back to saving Stinky, which is just a terrible option, because that mission started with Hutts and ended with the Battle of Teth. That massive loss of life, all for the son of the creature that had put Leia in chains.

She wonders if she has anything in her memory that doesn’t end in blood and graves.

“Soka.” Rex.

“Hm?”

“Remember that time Fives and Echo got lost in the undercity their first time on leave, and we had to get the General to help us find them?”

She does.

He’s right, that’s a good story.

“Okay, so what you have to understand,” Ahsoka says, already digging the faint details out and dusting them off, “is that these boys were ARC troopers, top-notch, terrifyingly competent once they got through specialty training, and loyal as hell. Echo had memorized the reg manuals front to back, and Fives was... well, Fives ended up being the only person to figure out the chips before they went into action. Point is, the Domino twins were good... eventually. Just like everyone else, though, they started out shiny.”

---------------------------

“Tholme’s hiding something.”

Ahsoka wonders if Leia will just leave if she ignores her enough. Probably not. This was the girl that got kicked out of boarding school for leading a sit-in at age seven. She’s got patience.

“His job requires him to hide a lot of things,” Ahsoka says instead. “Not as many as Vos will have to, eventually, but a lot.”

“He’s hiding something from us,” Leia insists, visibly frustrated that Ahsoka isn’t as upset about this as she is. “Something important.”

The way she says ‘important’ is clumsy and impacted by the missing baby tooth. She can’t say the r. It comes out as ‘im-poh-ten,’ which is adorable, and if Ahsoka comments on it, she’s probably going to get punched by a six-year-old.

“The Force doesn’t care,” Ahsoka says. “I trust his intentions, if not him as a person.”

“If you don’t trust him, then why trust his intentions?”

“Leia, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I trust one and a half people in the galaxy,” Ahsoka points out. “Me not trusting a person isn’t a sign of anything except my paranoia. The only person I trust fully and without reservation is Rex. Even you, I only mostly trust, because my brain starts screaming if I think too hard. That’s why you’re the half.”

“Okay, whatever, paranoia aside,” Leia barrels on, “He should tell us. Whatever it is that he’s hiding, we deserve to know. We’re not children that he can just hide things from for our own good.”

Ahsoka presses her lips together. “Leia. Princess. I know you’re used to holding all the cards--”

“This isn’t about me being a control freak!”

“It is, though,” Ahsoka soothes, and smiles. “Your mother--the bio one--was the same way. You spent years as one of the leaders of the Rebellion, so obviously you’re used to having all the information, and people reporting to you... but Tholme is a Jedi Master. He reports to the Council and the Republic. Do you know how many people I kept secrets from while I was a padawan? We’re an unknown, Leia. They have no proof that we’re on their side, especially since we’re traveling with Fett.”

Leia crosses her arms and glares as hard as she can.

“I’m not going to bother him,” Ahsoka says. “I’ve already had, like, five unrelated mental breakdowns. I’m putting this on hold until we get to the Temple and I can trust that there’s a healer on hand to sedate me or something.”

“You... want to be sedated?”

“Leia, this... really should be obvious, but a Force-Sensitive losing their osik the way I have been isn’t actually safe. I know I broke a weapons rack last week.” Ahsoka gestures vaguely. “If the Jedi Master isn’t telling me something for reasons that might relate to my clear and obvious mental instability, I’m going to assume he’s got a point.”

“So he should tell me or Rex.”

“We’ll be on Coruscant in four days,” Ahsoka soothes. “Just... let it be. They won’t hurt us.”

“You don’t know that.”

Ahsoka shrugs. “I don’t have to. The Force leads me in all things, including this.”

Leia isn’t impressed by that, but Leia isn’t impressed by much in the first place.

She strides off in a fit that is, perhaps, more influenced by her six-year-old emotional control than she’d like to admit. Ahsoka lets her. It’s not worth the argument.

It’s only a few minutes later that Fett strides in, takes the seat Leia was just in, and asks, “What would it take for you to teach me how to use a jetii’kad?”

She blinks at him. “You want to learn how to use a lightsaber?”

“Yes.”

“...why?”

“Viszla.”

“I see.”

She does.

Ahsoka taps her fingers against the table, eyeing him with the kind of interest she copied from Master Kenobi, years ago. Fett doesn’t fidget, but she thinks he might want to. He just looks back, waiting for her judgement.

“You’ll need to justify it,” she finally says. “It’s a significant difference from what you actually did, so I need to know your reasoning for doing it, and your plans for once it’s done.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s step one,” she corrects. She tilts her head, considering. “My standards for you aren’t built in a vacuum, and you know that. Explain to me what you plan to do and how you plan to do it, and if I approve...”

“You’ll help me achieve it.”

“Maybe,” she allows. “A lot of that depends on Rex.”

“I expected as much,” Fett says. “He is... an admittedly large part of the reason.”

“He would be,” she says. She gives the silence a few more seconds to sit awkwardly between them, and then stands up. “I’d guess you’ve been brainstorming already. Do you have it written down or is it mostly just in your head so far?”

“I’m still... debating options, so to speak.”

She grins, and the shape of the predator’s smile, the baring of teeth... that almost makes him step back. She can see it in the twitch of his muscles. Smart man.

“Follow me,” she says, and doesn’t wait for him to stand. She strides out with tooka-light steps, hears the heavy beskar tread behind her, and goes to the cargo hold. Fett’s confusion grows tangibly behind her, especially when she tosses him a wooden quarterstaff. She picks up the other and spins it in one hand.

“You’re going to fight me,” she tells him, stretching and letting the staff help with the process. “And while we fight, you’re going to tell me what your plans for Mandalore are.”

He mimics her, but there’s a frown on his face. “And why staffs?”

“You and I, we’ve only sparred bare-handed,” she says. “I need a feel for how you fight with a weapon anyway. These are a good start.”

“Not the beskad?”

She grins, and the twitch is back. “No. That can wait. We start with the staffs.”

He takes a stance, and she mirrors him. She lets him strike first with a weapon, but she’s the one that asks all the questions.

(He is the only one on the ship that can fight her one-on-one right now, and he can win. Still, she makes him work for every inch, and what she doesn’t win in bruises, she wins in words.)

(Fett might yet be a proper Mand’alor, but Ahsoka learned war from her brothers, negotiation at the knee of a general and in the shadow of a prince, and government at the side of duchesses and queens.)

(If he wants her help uniting his people, he needs to prove that he can hold them together once she’s gone.)

---------------------------

Ahsoka’s interrogation of Jango’s plans is thorough, and she’s not the only one involved. She brings Leia in, and has her join in on the grilling. She maybe laughs as the twenty-seven-year-old survivor of Galidraan, the Mand’alor, a man who has killed Master Jedi with his bare hands, gets lectured on various government structures by a tiny girl that's missing several teeth and needs to sit on books to see the table properly.

Still, Leia knows this better than any of the rest of them do. The girl might have grown up heir to a monarchy, but she got a classical education and was drilled on democracy and all associated forms of government. Where Ahsoka knows military protocol and law enforcement, intersystem relations and defensive measures, Leia knows agricultural subsidies and welfare programs, infrastructure and education.

Ahsoka may know how to find out if someone’s breaking a zoning law, but Leia knows why it exists in the first place.

“And I grew up in a cult,” Rex says, when an argument on that topic breaks out. Everyone that hasn’t heard the joke-that-isn’t-a-joke stares at him. “The Jedi grew up in a religious meritocracy; Leia grew up in a monarchy; and I grew up in a cult.”

Ahsoka elbows him. He’s not wrong, but still.

Unfortunately, Ahsoka is about forty-seven percent sure that Leia will put her foot in her mouth when it comes to Mandalorian culture, blunt as the girl is. That prefrontal cortex isn’t anywhere near as developed as it should be, either, so impulse control for the princess isn’t great. Ahsoka refuses to let Leia and Fett talk about ways to mend the breaks between tradition and the pacifism of the New Mandalorians without either Rex or Ahsoka herself as a mediating presence. Tholme sits in a few times, but while he knows that Leia isn’t really six--though not about the time-travel, yet--Quinlan doesn’t.

They admittedly end up doing this while he’s on Maul-sitting duty.

“It’s like he doesn’t even care about making nice with the people that, at this point, make up the majority of his people!” Leia grumbles one night, as Ahsoka kicks over a step stool so the girl can brush her teeth. “He may not like the New Mandalorians, but from what I understand, it’s still early enough to prevent the majority of the cultural bleaching you brought up. If he stays this stubborn--”

“Leia,” Ahsoka says, and the girl’s mouth snaps shut. “I’m aware of your reasons for not trusting his intentions. But if I may say? Chill.”

“He’s not even trying!”

“He’s trying a hell of a lot harder than he did in the original timeline,” Ahsoka reminds her. “Brush your teeth.”

“I’m not a--”

“Teeth.”

It’s a little worrying, how the child’s brain affects Leia, but... well. That’ll pass in time, hopefully. Until then, Ahsoka gets to be the aunt she should have been. This includes tucking Leia in, which the girl grumbles about despite the fond waves of comfort that enter the Force around her. Ahsoka doesn’t call her out on it, just brushes back wisps of hair to plant a kiss on Leia’s forehead, and then does the same once Rex stumbles in, grumbling about the limitations of a cadet’s body, but far more ready to follow the protocol that is bedtime.

Rex doesn’t pretend to not like getting tucked in, for all that he’s sharing with a grumbly, already-asleep princess. He smiles up at Ahsoka, lets her hug him, and pretends they can be a normal family for five seconds.

Quinlan’s making a late night snack for himself in the galley. Tholme is guarding the Baby Sith. Fett...

Ahsoka goes to the cockpit, takes the copilot’s seat, and watches hyperspace pass them by.

It takes long minutes before either of them say anything.

“Do Jedi believe in souls?”

His shields are up, locked up tighter than the innermost chambers of the Imperial Palace. She has no idea where he’s taking this question. She has to cast about for an answer.

“That depends on how you define a soul,” she finally says. “Leia told me about Force Ghosts. A Jedi Master who underwent the right meditations and training could pass into the Force upon their death without losing their sense of self. They could remain themselves, to an extent, and interact with force-sensitive individuals. I don’t know if they could last that way indefinitely, but depending on your definition, I could argue those ghosts were evidence of a form of soul.”

“So you believe that the dead pass into the Force, but that what passes could be a soul. Something must exist for a sense of self to disappear at death in a way that impacts the Force as you understand it, and many would use the word ‘soul’ for that something.”

“Mm,” Ahsoka considers it. “I’d say that’s pretty accurate. You’ve put a lot of thought into this.”

“What about those not yet born?”

Her fingers feel cold, and she finds herself no longer able to watch the passage of hyperspace as passively as she had, and her eyes catch on streaks and motes of what is not dust, her vision unable to keep any more still than her heart.

“Oh,” she hears herself say. “The clones.”

It’s a long time before he answers, but the walls come down. He carries a confused sort of grief with him, guilty and a mite resentful. His questions have been building for longer than she’d thought. His voice is rough. “I’ve taken plenty of lives, but I’ve never known the name of someone I erased from existence before they were even born.”

“The stories we told Leia about the brothers.”

There’s a grunt of agreement from Fett, so those dots at least connect.

“I take it my answer wasn’t helpful,” she manages to say.

“Will they still exist?” Fett asks. “Will they be born elsewhere? Or is... is a soul something that only comes into existence after the body does?”

“I have no idea,” Ahsoka admits. “I want... I want to think that I’d be able to find them eventually, to recognize them, if their souls are still born into this world elsewhere.”

“And if your Sith finds someone else to build his army out of?”

Ahsoka looks at him, sharp and pointed. “You wouldn’t.”

“They’ll be doing it anyway, if their plans are as ironclad as you say.”

“You’re already associating with Jedi,” Ahsoka says, fighting the urge to break his nose. “They wouldn’t approach you, not now. They can’t leverage your anger against you. They won’t know everything, but they’ll know that you have friends among the Jedi.”

“You think they can’t come up with better lies?”

He has a point. He has more than one point and she hate hate hates it.

A Jedi does not hate.

I am no Jedi.

“You’re going to have to convince me,” she says. “Especially if you want to somehow balance this with the darksaber thing. I won’t teach you how to fight with it if you’re not planning to retake Mandalore.”

“That’s how they’d sell it,” he says. “Retaking Mandalore. An army ostensibly for the Jedi, and ultimately...”

“You’d build an army of slaves.”

“No, I’d be the inside man for when they build that army anyway.”

She holds his gaze. She looks away first.

“Torrent?”

“I’m thinking.”

He lets her.

“I’ll need to talk to Rex. Probably Leia.”

“Understandable.”

“I don’t like this.”

“I’m only just considering it. It’s an idea, not a plan.”

“That’s the only reason I haven’t ripped your throat out with my teeth.”

“Hyperbole doesn’t suit you.”

She glares at him, and leaves, her mind chopping up and laying out every possible angle on Fett volunteering to do the exact same thing as last time, but somehow worse.

Great. Just what she needed.

---------------------------

Ahsoka isn’t there for the shouting match between Rex and Fett, but she doesn’t have to be. She can hear it form clear across the ship, and Rex comes to her afterwars. He’s been crying, which isn’t as surprising as it could be. These bodies are still prone to such things, and will be for years. She doesn’t comment.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asks.

“We need to take out Sidious before he starts anything on Kamino.”

“Agreed,” she says. “It’ll be hard, though.”

“I don’t care.”

“What did Fett say?”

“That if it wasn’t going to be my brothers, it would be someone else’s. Either we stopped the cloning from happening at all, or we mitigated damage by being there.”

“I don’t think Sidious is going to tap him for it,” Ahsoka admits. “Not unless you’re willing to stage that kind of fight publicly enough for Fett to claim the Jedi poisoned you, family, against him. It could work, but it’s a gamble.”

He knows all of this.

“I miss them,” he says, and she cards her fingers though the curls he’s managed to grow in the past weeks. “I just... even at the end, I had Wolffe. I knew Boba was out there; I wouldn’t be surprised if the beskar let him survive a Sarlacc. I had brothers. Not as many as I used to, but there was always someone. I miss them all, so much it hurts.”

“It wouldn’t be them,” she reminds him. She pulls him closer, puts her cheek to his head. “It would be the same process, the same faces, the same training, even, but the boys themselves...”

He clings to her and shudders.

“Rex?”

“I can’t force them to grow up the way I did. I want them back. Sidious is going to make the army no matter what. Someone’s going to suffer, and I don’t want it to be my brothers, but they won’t exist otherwise, and...”

“And it’s an impossible choice,” she summarizes. “And it sucks.”

“It’s sucks Gungan balls, ‘Soka.”

She laughs, and feels him smile against her shoulder. Good. He needs to smile more.

“He’s still trying to get me to like him,” Rex says. "He’s still making an effort, and he never did that for anyone except Boba, and it’s weird. I don’t know what to do with any of that.”

“Gain a brother,” Ahsoka whispers, and she feels him jerk against her. “If that’s what you want.”

“He’s not vod.”

“Same blood as all the rest, and you’re older than him, so he’s not really in a position to be a parent to you like he was to Boba,” she says carefully. “You don’t have to do anything, if you don’t want to, but... I think he’s trying. I think this means a lot to him, and that he isn’t any more sure of what to do than you are. You don’t have to forgive him for what he did in the future, you don’t have to accept when he reaches out, you don’t have to ever talk to him again after we reach Coruscant if you don’t want, but I think... I think it’s worth at least considering what you have to gain. I think it’s worth looking at what he’s trying to give you.”

Rex huffs. “Why couldn’t he just be the shabuir I knew in training?”

“Something happened between now and then?” she offers. “I don’t know. I never met him in the original timeline. I just know the guy that keeps trying to get on my good side so you’ll like him.”

He outright scoffs. “Soka, that’s not the only reason he’s trying to get on your good side.”

“...I’m a former Jedi who talks trash to his face,” she says slowly. “And I cried on him. There is no reason for him to be nice to me, other than you.”

“He thinks you’re cool and a good person and wants you to be his friend.”

“Bantha poodoo.”

Rex grins in a way that goes straight to smirking. “Soka, I’m not joking. Jango Fett wants you to be his friend.”

“Kriffing why?” she asks, more than a little horrified. “I’m a mess, look like I’m ten years younger than him, have gleefully kicked his ass in front of an audience; I even told Vos to throw him at a baby Sith Lord. Putting up with me is one thing, but I’m... I’m only barely not a Jedi. I’m a historical enemy of Mandalore, and part of the community he hates more than anything, and--”

“And his reaction to you kicking his ass was pure Mando,” Rex says. “In that he now thinks you’re a badass, and thus worth being friends with.”

“I can’t believe that. I physically cannot.”

“Soka, just accept it. The Mand’alor wants to be friends with you.” He scratches at his scalp. “I mean, he met you while you were protecting what appeared to be children, and it’s apparently still early enough for him to care about that.”

She leans back in her seat, eyes on the wall ahead of her and back against the cool metal of the other side. Rex falls back with her. She wonders if Rex changed the subject so they didn’t have to talk about deciding how many of his brothers get to exist, and whether or not he can swallow the bitterness of his history to have a connection with at least one member of his blood. She doesn’t ask. If he wants to change the subject, that’s his right.

“I don’t... no.” She denies it as well as she can, and then the implications dig a little deeper. “Is this me accidentally signing up to be the Jedi Order’s official liaison to the Mand’alor?”

“I mean, this point in time... they’ve got Kenobi for the Duchess, yeah?” Rex shrugs. “Good relations with the system are probably a good thing, and you’ve got a stronger connection than Tholme and Vos.”

“Ugh,” she says. She rubs a hand against her head, and then lurches to her feet. “Fine! Fine. If it’ll get him to retake Mandalore before the Sith decide to bribe him with an army he doesn’t get to keep, I’ll teach him how to fight for the kriffin’ Darksaber.”

“That’s what makes the decision for you?”

“Well something had to!”

They only get one lesson in before Coruscant, but the lesson lasts a full day, and Ahsoka’s got his comm number. Fett’s a quick learner anyway, and Tholme was there to give pointers where Ahsoka couldn’t.

He won’t measure up to a Jedi in saber-to-saber combat, but he doesn’t need to. He just needs to learn enough to turn all those skills with a beskad to something that works with a jetii’kad.

(The balance of a saber is wrong to those used to a physical weapon. The inertia doesn’t work the way anyone expects. There’s no need to worry about damaging the blade.)

(Fett is good. Ahsoka is better. And, bless his heart, he knows it.)

(She will mold him into the shape of someone who not only can, but should rule a system with a history like that, and he damn well knows that too.)

---------------------------

“Dropping out of hyperspace in T-minus twenty seconds.”

The Slave I is not, in fact, a Venator-class starship, or anything else near the size and smoothness of the ships that Ahsoka grew up on. This is a bounty hunter’s vessel, and the drop to real space jolts like nothing else. Ahsoka’s in the copilot seat for the return, but Tholme’s going to swap with her as soon as they’ve got confirmation that there were no problems with exiting hyperspace, and nobody’s shooting at them.

“We’re not going to get shot at,” Tholme had assured her.

“I always get shot at,” she’d told him.

“I have our clearance,” he reminded her, seeming more amused than frustrated. “There’s no need to worry about getting shot at.”

“I also always get shot at,” Jango had thrown in.

“Okay,” Tholme had allowed, after several minutes of his trust in the Temple warring against Ahsoka and Jango’s learned paranoia. The looks Quinlan had darted around the room when Leia and Rex also claimed ‘chronic getting-shot-at disease’ had been a treat. The paranoia of a Watchman and a future Shadow was great, but the paranoia of three revolutionaries and a galaxy-wide criminal was greater. “You can take us in close enough to get in radio contact, but the second we have to ask for clearance and a vector, I’m in the seat.”

She’d agreed, of course. She was paranoid, not inexperienced.

“We’re much less likely to get shot down by ground control if you tell them we’re with you,” she’d said, to his hilariously apparent metaphysical exhaustion. “Obviously.”

“Good enough,” he’d sighed.

What that means is mostly just that Ahsoka gets to watch the distant star at the center of Coruscant’s system grow rapidly brighter. She can pick out the constellations she’d grown up with, the stars the creche had projected on the ceiling every night, the ones that she may not have seen from the surface, but had greeted her and then sent her on her way every time she left on yet another campaign that lost her men their lives for a Sith Lord's wretched plans. These were the shapes and stories she’d never seen again as Fulcrum, a woman so hunted that to come within a dozen subsectors of the planet was to court her death.

For sixteen years, she hadn’t ventured closer than Alderaan, save for a single trip to Chandrila.

And now, maybe twenty minutes away at this speed, was the Temple. It was home.

A home that didn’t know her, that had sentenced her to death, that had hosted the rampage of her former master... but home nonetheless.

“Stable?” Fett grunts.

“Thrusters are good,” she confirms.

“I meant you.”

Ah. “I’m... fine. As good as I could be, anyway.”

She hesitates, but manages to speak before he does. “You?”

“I’m not the one walking into an entire building of triggers.”

“Only because you’re not entering it,” she says. “It’s the home of your ancestral enemies who, bad info or no, killed off a whole lot of your friends.”

“I get to leave,” he says. “You don’t.”

She plans to needle him a bit more, maybe on something a little less based in both their traumas. She needs to talk, if only to fill up the silence and keep herself from reaching out to all the lights in the Force. It’ll be too much, she knows.

Tholme enters the cockpit. “Change of plans.”

“Better be a good reason,” Jango says, voice flat.

“Leia’s crying.”

Ahsoka’s unbuckling herself before she can process the words fully. “What?”

Leia doesn’t cry for no reason. Her emotional control is as difficult as the body makes it, but she doesn’t just cry. There’s always a cause.

“I don’t know. Rex said to get you,” Tholme explains. “She was saying a name. He seemed to recognize it.”

Not good not good not good. If Leia was feeling the Emper--No. She cuts the thought off there. No catastrophizing. Information first.

“What name.”

“Luke. Mean anything to--and she’s gone.”

Ahsoka ignores him, just sprints to where she knows the ‘young ones’ are. They’re all in Maul’s room, because nobody wants to be alone with him now, but it’s the worst time to leave him without supervision. It’s not the worst option; he mostly refuses to talk, still.

This holds true, because he definitely isn’t talking when she bursts in. He’s sitting on the bench, in a corner, hugging his knees and watching Quinlan try to calm Leia down.

“Captain, sitrep.”

“Vos and Tholme attempted to show Leia how to reach out to feel the Temple from a distance. They felt that it would be a good use of the time, and an interesting exercise at this distance. She attempted to do so, struggled for several minutes, and then reacted with shock. She has repeated the name ‘Luke’ several times since then, and we’ve been unable to fully calm her down. I asked Tholme to get you, as you are the only Force-Sensitive on board that understands the situation in full.”

“Understood.” She nods to him, and then goes to nudge at Quinlan. “Vos, move.”

“Torre--”

“You can sit behind her, hold her in your lap like you did when we had lunch the other day, but I need to get in her face.” She waits for him to comply, and then drops to her knees and takes Leia’s hands in her own. She radiates calm and assurance, even though she knows Quinlan’s probably been doing the same since this started. She dips her head enough to get in the girl’s line of sight, waits for her to meet eyes.

“Princess,” she says, and meets Leia’s eyes. “What did you feel?”

“Luke.”

From this distance... they’ve got half the system to go, at least, and Leia’s training shouldn’t reach that far for anything more than the fact that the Temple is there. Ahsoka could feel unshielded individuals from here, if she focused, but she’s also been doing this much, much longer. The twins theory holds more water than ever.

“Can you show me?” Ahsoka asks, instead of asking for more clarification. She squeezes Leia’s hands and smiles. “In the Force?”

Leia nods, and closes her eyes. It’s not the first time they’ve done this, but it’s the first time in a while that Leia’s needed Ahsoka to guide her through.

Luke’s light, for all that it’s unfamiliar to Ahsoka, is brilliant among the rest of the signatures in Coruscant. Like Anakin and Leia, he’s a star in his own right, but he’s brighter. He doesn’t have Anakin’s bitterness or Leia’s righteous anger, just... light. Ahsoka had asked Leia to show her instead of looking for herself because she’d expected to not recognize the boy, but she needn’t have. He’s unmistakable.

He’s so bright that she almost misses the other signature that she does recognize. She shies away, knowing that it would be there, but... but it’s almost twinned with another nearby. Not identical, but different in a way that comes with age, with trauma, with... death.

Leia hadn’t arrived alone, after all.

Why would Luke?

Her eyes snap open, her hand coming up not-quite-fast enough to clap over her mouth as she gasps. She feels a shudder, one that starts in her shoulders and reaches deep into her ribcage, finds a home in her chest and doesn’t stop.

“Oh fuck,” Quinlan whispers. “Torrent? Um, Sokari?”

Rex steps closer. “Commander?”

“That shabuir faked his death again,” she manages. “Three times, Rex!”

He blinks at her. “...I know way too many people who fit that description, Soka.”

“Master Ke--” she cuts herself off. He might have changed his name, just like she had. There’s already an Obi-Wan here. Rex seems to be figuring it out, but she needs to give him another hint.

“He pulled a Hardeen,” she stresses, and Rex’s eyes snap shut with a tired groan.

“Who?” Leia asks, her own tumult of emotion paused in the wake of Ahsoka’s shock. There’s a hope and relief to her, and Ahsoka belatedly realizes that her main worry had been that she’d misidentified what was going on, that she’d given herself a false hope. Ahsoka’s internal reaction, her approval and awe at Luke’s presence, had trickled over enough to give Leia the reassurance she’d needed.

Unintentional as it was, Ahsoka was glad that she’d succeeded in helping her charge.

“Er...” she trails off. “I don’t know what name he’s going by, right now. We’ve spent so long in hiding...”

“The man Luke knew as Crazy Old Ben,” Rex says, and Leia’s eyes light up.

“Oh,” she breathes. “General O--no, names. The High General, then.”

“Yeah,” Ahsoka says, not a little soft. “Yeah, I guess death didn’t stop him any more than it stopped me.”

“I could have told you that,” Leia says, smiling far too widely. She squirms where she still sits on Quinlan’s lap. “He was... he taught you, right?”

“As much my master as the official one,” Ahsoka says. She glances as Quinlan, feels Maul’s gaze on the back of her head. “Your f... my official master was very young when I was assigned to him. He wasn’t ready to teach, wasn’t even ready to be a knight, entirely, so my training was split between him and his master.”

Quinlan pops in at that moment, “Your grandmaster was military, too?”

We all were, she thinks. Even you, in your own way.

“I landed in their care mid-battle,” she says carefully. “It was a complicated situation.”

He nods, and she vaguely notes that he’s got his arms wrapped around Leia, and his chin tucked on top of her head. She isn’t sure if Leia’s noticed, but Quinlan’s picked up ‘baby’-sitting duty so often recently that she’s fairly certain he’s all but declared her ‘little-sister shaped.’ It doesn’t matter that Leia’s older--she’s still taking the juice boxes and gummy snacks that Quinlan shoves at her every single snacktime.

“Do you think...” Rex trails off, something uncomfortable twisting in the Force, even though his face keeps it mostly hidden. “My brothers. If the General survived and... and made it back...”

“I didn’t feel any,” Ahsoka says, because she knows she’d have noticed if it was anyone she’d met, and likely any clone at all. They all felt different in the Force, but they all held a spark that made her know it was one of them. “I’m sorry, Rex’ika.”

“A long shot,” he says, that dash of hope shriveling up. He must see something in her face, because there’s a curl of warmth in him, even if his smile is brittle. “It’s fine, really. I have you, ‘Soka.”

Rex and Ahsoka. Two halves of one whole.

She can’t wait to hear the lectures on attachment, the way people who haven’t seen her wars try to criticize her for clinging to any chance at still having a will to live. She can’t wait to see them justify telling her that it’s selfish to hold her sanity in her hands and refuse to let the grief take it away. She can’t wait to stare someone down for asking her to ‘learn to let go’ after she’s lost her family, her life, her universe three times over.

Most of the Jedi are more sensible than that, are reasonable enough to see those shades of grey and how to approach rules in the spirit they are meant instead of the rigid letter, but there will be some.

There will be more than enough telling her she is wrong to hold her oldest, closest, best friend as dear as she can.

Attachment, they’ll say.

What they’ll mean is ‘codepedence.’

They won’t be entirely wrong.

She reaches out for him, lets him fall into her side and stay there, closes her eyes and reaches out for the man she’d long called father, when they’d still been in each other’s lives.

This time, past the deafening flare of surprise-love-hope of the little star next to him, she can feel him reach back.

---------------------------

The second the ship has landed, even before Tholme and Fett are done with the checks, Ahsoka’s waiting at the exit. She strains her hearing so she’ll know the second the system will let her open the massive door of the cargo hold.

Leia clings to her side, and the boys stand to her back.

Quinlan’s stressed enough that she can feel it like a cloud. She is very much not trying to feel that stress. Quinlan’s stress levels, back where he’s got Maul so he can keep an eye on Ahsoka and the Baby Sith at the same time, are so low on her priorities list that it’s a a little sad.

It doesn’t take long for her to be able to punch the button and open the damn door.

It opens slowly. She bounces on her toes, because there’s a beacon of light and a steady, familiar glow on the other side, and she’s so, so close. She can’t see through the crack yet, because it’s day in this part of Coruscant, and the sunlight is blinding against the dark of the hold. So close. She’s so close.

“The hell’s wrong with you?”

Fett? Fett. He’s already here to get off? This door’s slow.

She doesn’t answer him, because the door is finally open enough to let her out, and she leaps through the gap.

She lands on a pourstone floor, feels pebbles and grit compress under her boots, frantically looks around as her eyes adjust to light and--

The High General, the Negotiator, Master Obi-Wan Kenobi, looking just as he did when she first met him, if a little less armored and a little more fed. The hair, the beard, the crinkle in the corner of his eyes. His spirit is a little older, his smile a little more strained, his posture a little more tired, but it’s him.

He spreads his arms, low enough that she could have dismissed it if she’d cared less for hugs, except she’s almost as small as she was when they met.

And every other hug she’d given back then had been, functionally, her being a living missile aiming her montrals for someone’s organs.

She’s a little more aware of how to avoid stabbing her friends in the intestine now.

“Master!”

She sprints for him, collides and sobs, feels him stumble back and then sink to his knees on the too-hard floor, and can feel the tears pouring out of her already. Her breath hitches, and she wails like a child, and that last part of her that couldn’t even grasp at safety shreds itself. His arms are tight around her, warm and strong and Master Kenobi don’t you dare leave again.

It doesn’t matter that Sidious is out there, that the Republic’s been building towards war for a century, that even now someone’s kicking up the Trade Federation. Her dad is here.

“I’ve missed you too, my dear,” he says, pressing a kiss to the side of her head, the bristles of his beard scratching along the skin of her forehead. Off to the side, the binary suns that are Luke and Leia grow brighter in proximity, so bright she can barely bear it.

(“Fett, why the kriff are you reaching for your blaster?!”)

(“Torrent said her master tried to kill her.”)

(“Different guy, that was a different guy, put the blaster away.”)

(“You could have just warned me.”)

(“I didn’t expect you to go for a shot on sight!”)

(”Calm down, Jetiika, if I was going to shoot on sight, we’d already be in a firefight.”)

She ignores everything.

“If you fake your death one more time, I swear I’m going to kill you myself.”

He tries to pull away to talk to her more directly. She does not let him. He apparently resigns himself to this, because he just adjusts how he’s sitting and pulls her in closer.

“In my defense, I was far from the only one presumed dead that took advantage of that status, by the end,” he says, letting her slump into his lap and cry herself dry. “I’m proud of you. You know that, I hope.”

She nods against his chest, smearing tears and snot across the linen and wool. She doesn’t care that they’ll need a thorough washing. She can have her public breakdown and it’s fine because Master Kenobi is here.

He doesn’t even know what she’s spent the past fifteen years doing. Luke wouldn’t have known. He doesn’t know she’s thirty-two and broken, beyond a shadow and cut down by her own master. There’s so much he doesn’t know but the Force rings with the truth of it: he’s proud of her anyway.

“I’m going by Ben, now,” he mutters against her montral. “There’s already an Obi-Wan here, after all. Still, I remain a Kenobi.”

She can’t make the words come out of her mouth. She’s overwhelmed, so much so that speech is a mite bit beyond her.

Sokari Torrent, she presses along the frayed bond that’s knitting itself back to life with every breath they take. Leia was already calling me Auntie Soka, and Rex and I both took Torrent, for...

“For the men you lost,” he mutters. “Yes, that’s fitting.”

He smells like sapir tea and a spiced beard oil.

There’s a whirl of activity about her, greetings and ‘a Sith apprentice?’ and introductions. She distantly notes when Fett almost shoots Dooku before Rex shuts that down and advises the Master to leave the area before things spiral out of control. She feels Ben stand, and she stands with him, clings to his side like a child and trusts that whatever happens, whatever needs to happen, he’ll take care of it until she can stand on her own two feet without swaying.

Rex grabs her free hand, and she feels herself settle back into her skin, bit by bit.

She’s back at the Temple. The twins are safe. Her grandmaster is here. She has her other half.

They can save the galaxy this time.

She’s alive she’s home she’s okay.

She’s okay.

Everything’s going to be okay.

[azthedragon]

Oh, hello there new ideas... you are not suppose to ring at the door when I already have so many others to deal with...

Guess who's back into Randy Cunningham 9th Grade Ninja?

Yes, that's me.

Anyway, considering I already have a folder full of stories I SHOULD finish before embarking onto something else, I decided to leave this here for people to, I don't know, doing it themselves, because, well, I would read this the moment it came out.

.

It’s a crossover between RC9GN and My Hero Academia:

- Story is from Howard and Randy's point of view. Mostly.

- Howard has a transformation bird quirk that somehow ended up being called “The Tengu” (prolly Randy's fault). He can't control it and has caused a lot of damage over the years

- Randy is quirkless, but being part of a family of Ninjas with over 800 years of history, he knows various martial arts and can bring down opponents stronger and faster than he is with minimal effort. Give him a weapon (a sword especially), and he can be deadly. His family has made sure he could take care of himself.

- The Ninja suit is not magical in origin (nor made from the Tengu's feathers), but a heirloom passed down from the Dawn of Quirks era. Created by one of the Ninjas in the clan with a quirk that let them weave cloth and quirks together. The process was lost to history, but the end result is that the ninja suit has quirks woven into it, effectively giving Randy several quirks to use (the most powerful being the Art of Healing since it can resurrect living creatures long dead).

- The NinjaNomicon is another family heirloom from the Dawn of Quirks. Just another of the clan using their quirk to create a sentient book that could collect knowledge and guide future generations.

- Not sure if Randy and Howard were forced to leave Norrisville or never lived there to begin with. What matters is that they end up in Musutafu.

- Whatever it is that happens, Howard is forced to attend UA due to the need to learn how to control his quirk (somehow, counseling and suppression methods don't work). Randy tags along, because he is all for being a hero.

- Bakugo Katsuki still gets the most villain points, with Randy on second. But because Randy also help out others when they need, he scored enough hero points to take lead.

- Howard somehow manages to get in the middle of the ranking. He's lazy, not stupid.

- Izuku still get last spot (poor broccoli boy)

- Mineta Minoru might or might not exist. Howard could easily take his place in the story and we'd lose nothing.

- Shenanigans ensues. Mostly Howard doing things (he doesn't really care about being a hero) and Randy having to bail him out. Often with the use of the ninja suit. Especially when he loses control of the Tengu quirk.

- The Sorcerer's powers are a quirk called “Chaos”. He can turn anyone into monsters as long as there's a negative emotion. Thankfully, saving the victims is as easy as it is in the show. Just... very chaotic at times. Lots of collateral damages due to rampaging monsters before they are dealt with.

- The Sorcerer has been hunting Randy's clan because he wants the suit and the secrets contained into the NinjaNomicon. Also because the ninjas have been stopping him since the very beginning of the era of quirks. Yes, the Sorcerer's quirk has also turned him into a monster that doesn't die of old age. Or something like that.

- Randy going to fight as the Ninja because this is a family problem and the Sorcerer won't stop until he show his masked face. The fight usually ends in a draw, with Randy foiling the Sorcerer's new plan and forcing him to retreat.

- Randy avoiding getting in troubles by using half truths and omissions. (“of course I smell like him, Mr. Inui. We're from the same clan of ninjas. We use the same weapons and tools. The entire family smell like Smoke Bombs!” or “oh yes, I know who the ninja is. No, I'm not going to tell you, Detective Tsukauchi. Some things are meant to stay secret.”)

Optional:

- All For One makes an offer to the Sorcerer. The Sorcerer might or might not accept depending on how he wants to achieve his end goal (kill the ninja and create a world of chaos)

- Aizawa fighting the Ninja. And either losing or loosing track of the vigilante kid. Damn those Smoke Bombs. And damn that Cunningham kid for not saying who the ninja is.

[aforrestofstuff]

Chapter 149 Expert Review Time

Hey gamers what’s up time for another CHAPTER 👏 REVIEW 👏

It was looking kinda bleak last time for pretty much everyone so I’m hoping things improved this time around, but it seems Murata and ONE are kinda going through their “I’m going to put my characters through the MOST” phase so… that feels unlikely. But nevertheless… still excited to see my favorite boys.

The 10000th Psychic Sister cover. Murata, I’m begging you. There’s literally like 30 other characters to choose from. I know you like drawing boobs but imma need you to put the pencil down for a minute and take a walk because this just ain’t IT.

“Summer is coming” it is July. Summer has been here for ten years. I’m so fucking hot all the time. Everything has been evaporated out of me and I’m literally a raisin.

The Psychic Sisters covers are just so devoid of life a lot of the time… I wouldn’t mind if it was them fighting or engaging in everyday activities but when they’re posed for the camera and deliberately placed there to look sexy it just sucks all the human out of them. The cover/splash page is a great chance to show characters in a new light!!! It’s mostly set away from the story so you can do whatever you want! Choosing to make 80 fanservice covers is just wasted opportunity for what could be additional character development. It’s gotten to a point where even the smegma-slinging bitchboys on Reddit are complaining about the excessive sexy covers…. When PussySlayer384756 complains that there’s too much tittage being shown, that’s how you KNOW we’ve got a problem. Now, idk how the fan climate is in Japan but I can’t imagine they’re feeling much different over there either.

Also, her anatomy is… janky. Her tit is bigger than her head, her belly is too long, and she’s got like 4 spare ribs. Like, I’m by no means an art expert but it doesn’t take a chef to know the soup is shit, you know what I mean? I feel like page after page of Murata drawing obscene muscle men has made him rusty on what should be (somewhat) normal-looking people.

Darkshine learns what TRUE peak male performance looks like.

You’ve gotta wonder how Darkshine even got to the S-Class to begin with when he pussies out of nearly every single fight… except the one where the opponent was literal water. Everyone says that he just joined the association for additional validation, and I believe it… this boy is not cut out for actual hero-ing. 99% Of the time HE’S the one who needs a hero.

It kinda bothers me how useless he’s been post-Garou fight, especially when we spent like an entire chapter trying to console his ass. I get that’s part of his character and development… but it’s begun to slow things down. We get it. We don’t need to see him be insecure every time a new enemy pops up. One was enough. We would’ve gotten the same effect if he just sat out the entire time post-consolation, because everything that’s happened to him on the surface has been kinda redundant.

Here comes the boooyyy 🎶🎶

Nice callback. I’m glad Metal Bat is finally here. Bitch runs slow as fuck.

It’s nice to see him act on his own agency instead of orders from the hero association. He’s clearly much happier when helping out on his own accord, and has a ton of initiative too. The chapter he got with just he and King meeting up and slingshotting themselves to the fight was really a breath of fresh air from all of the fighting. It’s moments like these where ONE remembers that people like OPM for the characters, and not necessarily the pretty action sequences. I really like this duo. I like Metal Bat. I like it when they’re given time to be themselves and not just vessels for the next fight scene.

I know I said I wanted the heroes to die but Murata I’m begging you please don’t kill the child. You can kill Puri, though. I hate that fucker.

Child Emperor regularly visiting and eating with Bofoi even despite being his lab assistant would be a lot cuter if Bofoi wasn’t the human equivalent to a dog turd. I might’ve overstated that… seems like Bofoi is just using him as an errand boy. The clear lack of respect he has for CE is very indicative of his character and is not necessarily a bad thing plot-wise, but I would still like to beat him with a cane. Additionally, it’s clear that he’s not going to help the heroes here. At least, I don’t think so. His “fuck them kids” attitude seems to be a pretty big pillar in the building of his character and I doubt ONE would jeopardize that just because he’s written himself into a corner. Oh, well. We’ll see.

It’s very sweet that even when near death, CE still thinks of Zombieman. Aaaaghh it’s so GOOD when the characters actually LIKE each other. I know realistically not everyone is gonna be friends but man… it would be a lot cooler if we got more insight on their chemistry. Pleaz have more Metal Bat-and-King-esque chapters. I wanna see how everyone gets along.

Also, the concept of Puri just manifesting drilling powers and carving through solid rock with nothing else but pure strength and determination is so funny. A little convenient, sure, but I really don’t care because it’s actually done well. Their reunion scene is hilarious. More stuff like this pleaz….

I don’t even know what to say about Genos here. Dude, I know you made an oath to protect Tatsumaki or whatever, but there’s no shame in a good bail. You can’t even bail anymore because your damn legs are gone. See, this is what happens when you make promises. The secret to keeping your legs intact is doing the bare minimum. Hope this helps ❤️

He’s making a valiant effort but… I’m afraid he just ain’t gonna do much while roleplaying as a worm. Maybe he’ll make a chrysalis and come out as a butterfly. Wait, that’s caterpillars. Fuck. TATSUMAKI IS A GONER, BRO. WE NEED YOU TO BE THE DEUTERAGONIST!! IF YOU DIE WE LOSE 70% OF MERCH SALES NOOOOOOOO

Local man has a heart attack in front of thousands of little monsters and somehow saves the world, more at 5.

King I’m begging you please get that shit checked out that’s not NORMAL.

Yeah, I like this conclusion. Very tasteful cliffhanger. I mean we know King ain’t gonna do shit but SOMEHOW black sperm is gonna get punted like the little cumstain he is. Can’t wait to see the events that unfold next chapter… it seems like every scene that involves King turns out to be really funny and I’m super looking forward to black sperm seeing Jesus.

Also, a little off-topic but I just really like the way Murata inked his pants. Got a real comic book feel to it. I mean, he’s just really good at drawing clothes overall (save for Fubuki’s body-tight dress that is 100% not how women’s clothing works but I digress). Fucker understands fabric physics like I understand how to make a bomb ass chicken parm. I respect it.

In conclusion, lower everyone’s expectations of you and you might get to keep your arms and legs. This has been Life Lessons from Forrest. You now owe me 50$.

[aggressivelyclueless]

ouija board

in which it gets out of hand. . . but only a little

warnings: v spooky

(heads up this one’s kinda long, whoops lol)

(@qoinq-qhost u were looking for more danny being a lil shit? vvvv)

Sam was just about ready to get the seance rolling.  Thundery and weeping outside, candlelight inside - it seemed like a good night for it.  This time around, there were four of them: her, of course; Felicity, from third-hour, had brought the board; her bestie Star (who Sam had almost uninvited, as she hadn't been deemed goth enough, but she owed Felicity a favour and letting this slip was it); and Star's boyfriend-of-the-week, Jake (also not goth, and very much on thin ice).

They sat clustered together on the full-moon rug in Sam's room, a jumbo bag of Chex Mix forgotten on the floor by Jake's backpack.  Only the little brown bits were left.  "You're host," Felicity was saying, scooting up into a proper cross-legged sitting position and centering the board on the carpet between them.  She produced the most important piece - the polished wooden planchet - and dropped it into Sam's waiting palm.  "You start."

Star opened her mouth, almost thought better of it, and then asked, "Are we going to get a demon?"

"That's not how this works," said Felicity, shooting Sam a look to keep her quiet.  Felicity had the tolerance for questions like those, and the patience not to be cross.  "We're not summoning demons.  We're communing with the dead.  There's a difference."

"Is it still going to be scary?"

Sam bit her tongue.  With luck, it would be, and she wouldn't have to deal with Star's antics next time, whether they were at her house or not.

"I don't know," said Felicity, "Maybe.  We've never done one at this house before.  We might not get a ghost at all."

Sam shrugged, setting the puck down in the center of the board and keeping her first two fingers on it.  The others scooted closer, getting comfortable, and followed suit.  The candleflames throughout the room were perfectly still.

"Is there anyone here with us tonight?"

For a moment: nothing.  She glanced up into the empty air, as if she could spot a slinking shadow on the wall or a flickering shape hovering by the ceiling.  She couldn't, even though she wanted to.

Then the slight pull of the token under their collective fingers, and the drawn scraping sound as it crawled slowly across the board: YES.

So they weren't going to come up empty tonight.  She glanced over at Star, wondering how intense things would get before she'd bail.  Sam was certain that, at some point, she would, or maybe she was getting her hopes up.  Star didn't exactly look like goth material.  All things considered, this was probably the wrong scene for her.

But she had owed Felicity that favour.

"Why are you here, spirit?" Felicity asked, shifting a little in place.  Right to the point.

The planchet under their fingers was still.  Sam knew the rules better than anyone: if the ghost chose to answer, it would have to tell the truth.

The ghost chose not to.

Star's eyes darted to Felicity, but there was a hesitation before she spoke.  When she did, the words were wrung-out and barely there.  "Ask him if he's friendly."

"You ask him," said Jake, nudging her with an elbow.  Between the four of them, he was the least invested in the endeavor, seeming more bored than anything.  He shrugged, trying to scoot his letter jacket a little higher on his shoulders without having to take his fingers off the puck.  The jacket refused.

"Okay."  Star took a deep breath, turning her eyes back to the board.  The planchet, for the time being, rested on YES.  "Ghost," she said, somewhat uncomfortable at directly addressing the dead, "Do you mean us harm?"

Immediately, she could feel the wooden puck go cold under her touch.  It slid off YES, veered partway across the board, and went still again.  The chill at her fingertips vanished.

"Don't like the looks of that," muttered Felicity.  "Sam, you think we should call this one off?"

Sam gave it a moment of consideration.  "I don't know.  Maybe, but not yet.  Let me try once."  She cleared her throat.  "Spirit - will you tell us your name?"

The planchet didn't have to think about it this time.  Star could feel the cold tingling in her fingers again as it moved, slowly but deliberately, and spelled out: JAMES.  She frowned.

"What's your purpose here, James?" Felicity ventured, but the ghost revealed nothing.  The silence stretched on; finally, she sighed.  "Doesn't like me much, does he?"

"I don't know," said Star, which she thought sounded better than a flat-out no.  It didn't do any good; Felicity was already looking a little put-out, and Star reached up with her free hand and patted her on the shoulder.  "Don't feel bad.  We still like you plenty, even if that silly ghost doesn't."

Sam fought back a groan of distaste.  Whatever Felicity saw in Star, Sam was seeing none of it.  She wanted to tune Star out, didn't want to see her so distracted as if communing with the dead was a mere game.

If things started to hit the fan, Sam was sure she'd never want to come again.  In fact, she was starting to count on it.

But would provoking the ghost be worth it?  "James," she said, still contemplating it, "Why are you here?  What is it you're seeking?"

The puck meandered for a moment, as if conflicted.  It rested on the empty part of the board between F and S, turned around, and aimed mostly toward H.

That was when Star jerked her hand back, as if the planchet had burned her.  All of a sudden she seemed to be paying attention; Sam wondered if she had finally realized what, exactly, they were dealing with.  Whether she did or not, it was too late.  She'd disrupted the connection.

Sam had never seen it, but she'd heard the stories of what happened at sessions when someone did that.

Every single candle around the room went out at once.

"Star, what the hell," said Felicity, "Remember how earlier I said you couldn't do that - "

Star's already-high-pitched voice was pinched.  "Sorry, sorry!  It's just it got cold all of a sudden, I thought he wanted me to - "

Sam scowled in the dark.  "What are you talking about, no it didn't - "

"It did so!  Just now!"

"Oh for fuck's sake, I knew we shouldn't have invited you - "

"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?"

The flash of lightning through the window made the ghost into a spindly and angular silhouette, floating in the air by the glass and jolting Star and Sam both out of their argument.  The planchet on the board, still under six fingers but by now forgotten, shot out from under them and flew across the room, bouncing off the side of the desk and skittering somewhere under the bed.

Oh, it was hitting the fan now, all right.  "This is your fault," Sam hissed through her teeth, glowering in Star's direction, but already her mind was racing to find a way to appease the disturbed spirit.  She'd held plenty of seances before, but generally found audience with lesser or fragmented dead.  Only twice had she been forced to close a session early.

Never had she met such an angry spirit before - and not only was it angry, it was in her room.

"Ideas," Felicity snapped, in an effort to keep Sam from boiling over, and in the same effort to keep Star from tears, "What do we do?"

"Run, maybe?" said Jake, but the sharp and thunderous BANG from the walls around them cut him off.  His eyes darted to the door, but it slammed itself shut before he could get up to his feet and make his escape.

"Hold on a sec, guys," said Sam, "Jake, sit down, we're not done yet - hang on, I said!  I got a flashlight."  She groped for her backpack, brushed over one of eight plushy spider feet, and yanked it unceremoniously into her lap.  Half-unzipping it, she produced the promised flashlight and clicked it once, twice, a handful of times in quick succession as nothing happened.  "Shit.  Shit shit shit - "

"There," Star whispered, her eyes fixed on the shadowy side of the room behind the bed.  She pointed with one manicured finger, making the rest of them turn to look.

The ghost was only there for an instant, hanging in the air as a smoky and ill-defined shadow against the hazy grey light from the window, but flickered away an instant later.  The pounding rain outside almost masked the haunt's staticky and echoing laughter.

Felicity put a hand over Sam's and tried not to squeeze it too hard.  Her fingernails dug in a little anyhow.  "Do you think we can still close this out?"  She didn't sound too hopeful.

"No," said Star, with a sudden and bone-chilling certainty.  "He's staying."

Sam looked over at her, agape.  How can you know that? she wanted to say, but her mouth had gone dry and she couldn't force it to move.  Star's eyes were on her; just for a moment, Sam swore there was a glint of something behind their usual blue-grey, but it was there and gone before she could be sure.

"We're staying," she said again, and this time Sam heard the echo in it, and this time the glint of green in her eyes lingered.  The ghost had her, appearing as a dark and swaying wisp in the air behind her, hands on her shoulders, keeping her still and calm.  Her eyes - the ghost's seyes - were on Sam, and a sudden, absurd thought struck her:

Isn't James his middle name?

The knot of rising terror in Sam's gut broke, and cold tingling relief poured over her.  For a moment she let it, willing the adrenaline to fade and the pounding heartbeat in her ears to settle, and then shifted gears.

That sonofabitch, I'll kill him for this one.

"No, you're not."

Star's head and the shadow's head cocked to one side in unison.  "No?"

Sam was locked on the spirit but her voice was directed at Felicity (and Jake, but to a lesser extent).  "Come here."

Felicity hesitated.  "What, are you serious - ?"

"Come here," Sam snapped, setting her first two fingers on the center of the board, ignoring the fact that the planchet was still misplaced somewhere under the bed.

"I don't like this," Felicity whispered, but followed Sam's lead regardless.

Star's fingers came out and rested gingerly on top, and Sam was certain that, underneath the veneer of shadows, the ghost was smiling.

"You listen to me, James," Sam commanded, with a seriousness that made Felicity and Jake both flinch, "You'd better get out of here."

Star's mouth turned up in a smile.  "And why's that?"

"Because if you don't, I'll banish you into next week."

"Sam," Felicity breathed, "I don't think that's such a good idea - "

"I'll do it," Sam reiterated, cutting Felicity off.

The smils on Star's face widened.  "Promise?"

Then the fingers on the board were moving, overcome by a pins-and-needles sensation that turned the board to static beneath them, and came to rest solidly over GOOD-BYE.

"See you then. . . "

Sam looked over and Star looked back at her with those big blue eyes.  She didn't seem distraught but Sam had to wonder how much of what had happened she'd remember.  She'd heard on several occasions that those puppeteered by the dead didn't tend to recall the influence, and Star wasn't horribly upset.

Still - she felt that ghost had crossed a line somewhere.  Crashing a seance, fine.  Overshadowing at said seance, even if he'd picked the least-favourite attendee?

That didn't sit right.

"You okay, Star?"

Star blinked once, twice, then cocked her head to one side and smiled.  "Of course I'm okay," she said, as if she hadn't been overshadowed at all, but the next thing out of her mouth, spoken with the utmost certainty, sent a chill down Sam's spine.

"He wasn't really going to hurt me, you know.  He let you win."

- - - -

Sam shut the door as the others left and then rounded on the ghost.  "I know you're still here.  There's no way you'd dip after a stunt like that."

(Damn right I wouldn't) said the shadowy thing under the bed, hauling himself out of the darkness a moment later.  In the light from the ceiling fixture overhead, the shadows fell apart, relenting to his more human texture and shape, and he shook the dustbunnies off once he got up to his feet.  In his hand was the forgotten token that went with Felicity's board, and he held it out to her.  "This is yours?"

Sam grabbed it from him, and only then did he get the impression that she wasn't entirely happy with him.  "You could have given me a heads-up, y'know."

"Hey, I was in the area, thought you could use a hand.  For goth cool points, or whatever."  Danny shrugged, leaning back and half-sitting on the side of the bed.  "I mean they do think you can scare off a real ghost now."

"And what the hell was with you overshadowing Star?" Sam went on, and at last the dopish grin at the corner of Danny's mouth vanished.  "So, okay, maybe I didn't want her to come.  But that doesn't mean you get to - "

"Wait, wait, hold on," Danny put a hand up in concession, "I didn't - well, I mean I did, but.  Listen for a sec, okay?  You don't like her, fine.  But I think something's up."

"Something's up," said Sam, nonplussed.  She crossed her arms, leaning back slightly in the desk chair and making it creak.  "You overshadowing people as a joke is what.  And whatever you were telling her in there, guess what  She remembers it now."

"That's what's up," said Danny impatiently, "I didn't tell her anything."

That made Sam pause.  "What?"

"You heard me.  But that's not it, let me say something else too.  I swear I'm not making this up: she saw me the second I drifted in the window.  I'm invisible and she's looking right at me.  The whole time.  It was like she was watching me."

"Bullshit," said Sam, wanting to believe it was.

Danny shook his head.  "You heard what she said.  After you banished me into next week."

"That you let me win," Sam recalled slowly.  In the moment, it had struck her as dumb-chills naivety on Star's part, but the way that Danny talked made it sound like she was serious.  Perhaps she'd just wanted to think that Star was that stupid.

"She knew it, and I didn't tell her.  I'm dead serious, Sam, she practically invited me to overshadow her.  I didn't even have to go all the way in her.  You saw it."

Sam had most definitely seen it.  "And what does this mean for the rest of us?  Or for you?  You're gonna tell me - what, she's going to miraculously guess you're half-ghost too?"

"I don't know - but you saw her the same as I did.  She wasn't scared of me.  Hell, I gave you guys a name and she was the one that didn't call me by it.  Like she knew it wasn't quite right."

"I get it," said Sam, thinking that maybe she would have been just as well off not calling him that either, "But what are we supposed to do about it?  Are you saying we should invite her onto the team?  Or what?"

Danny sighed, running a hand through his hair and letting it come to rest on the back of his neck.  He shrugged helplessly, his gaze picking out dustbunnies and imperfections in the floorboards at his feet.  "I don't know yet.  Keep an eye on her, maybe.  See if she starts saying things.  She's not as stupid as she looks, Sam.  Low bar, I know, but the last thing I need right now is somebody else to have to watch out for.  I know you don't like her.  I'm not asking you to."

He met her eyes then,  and the earnestness in them struck her.

"Just, don't let that put her in the way, okay?"

[bumblesimagines]

Green Thumb

Part 24

Request: Yes or No

Lil short

~

"F.R.I.D.A.Y, call Bucky." You gripped the steering wheel, driving back to the city. You definitely couldn't leave Bucky alone. He'd either have a breakdown or burn the city to the ground.

"Calling Bucky... Call failed. Should I call Sam Wilson?"

"Oh, fuck, Sam.. Uhm, try Bucky again and then Sam. If Sam doesn't answer, call Sarah." You replied, swallowing as the city came into view. You hoped Monica would be able to handle whatever Wanda did. She was powerful but easy to talk to.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y, could you make the car go faster? My boyfriend might go on a killing spree and I don't have money to bail him out." You felt the car speed up, breathing out a thanks. The car slowed down upon entering the city, maneuvering through traffic before parking outside of the apartment building. You quickly got out of the car and entered, heading up to your shared apartment. You entered the apartment, hearing the tv echoing through the apartment.

"Babe? Baby?" You called out, checking the kitchen, bedroom, and livingroom. All the rooms were empty. You ran a hand through your hair, standing infront of the tv as John Walker, the new Captain America, spoke about being Captain America. You sighed, taking a seat on the couch. You rubbed your forehead, closing your eyes. You opened them when you heard the sound of paper crumbling, lifting your foot and seeing a sticky note. You picked it up, reading the writing on it.

'Meet me at this address -Bucky'

You frowned, standing up and typing in the address into your phone. You left the apartment, heading to your car. You got in, having F.R.I.D.A.Y drive to the location.

"Why would Bucky go there?"

"I believe Sam Wilson is working with the military there." You sighed softly at F.R.I.D.A.Ys' words. You hadn't seen Sam since Wanda had disappeared. You arrived at the airport, getting out and seeing Bucky.

"When I call you, answer it." You walked towards him. Bucky gave a small smile, extending his arms and wrapping them around you.

"Sorry, tiger. I need to have some words with Sam."

"About?"

"The Captain America wannabe." Bucky muttered bitterly, frowning as his gaze hardened. You placed a hand on his cheek.

"I'm sorry, Bucky.. Don't blame Sam for this. He probably didn't even know." You pressed a gentle kiss to his cheek. Bucky sighed, shoulders slumping slightly.

"I know.. But, he gave up the shield. Steve gave it to him and now some guy who never even met Steve is calling himself Captain America." Bucky shook his head, fist clenching. You placed a gentle hand on his arm, leaning in and planting a kiss on his neck.

"We can talk to him together but I can't stay around. If you need me, I can stay but-"

"No, no." Bucky offered a small smile. "Wanda needs you."

"Seems like everyone needs me." You smiled gently, taking his hand. Bucky returned the smile before turning and entering the building. You looked over the airplanes, humming softly. Your gaze landed on Sam, a smile appearing on your face.

"You shouldn't have given up the shield."

"Babe." You breathed out, looking at Bucky. He walked forward, approaching Sam. Sam shook his head.

"It's nice to see you too, Buck. How you been, (Y/N)?" Sam looked at him, ignoring the small irritated look Bucky kept giving him. You smiled, hugging him.

"Decent.. I've missed you and Sarah." You replied softly, stepping back. Sam nodded, walking forward. You looked at the young man following Sam.

"Joaquín Torres." He gave a small shy smile, extending his hand. You shook it, chuckling at the soft blush that spread across his cheeks. A slight look of panic crossed over his features. You turned to look at Bucky who gave him a death stare.

"He's in a mood, ignore him." You patted Joaquíns' arm.

"This outrage is gonna have to wait, Buck." Sam said, glancing at his friend. Bucky looked at him in disbelief.

"You didn't know this was gonna happen?"

"No, of course I didn't! You think it didn't break my heart to see them march him out there and declare him as the new Captain America?" Sam questioned. You walked faster, falling into step with them.

"This isn't what Steve wanted." Bucky told him, frowning. Sam sighed heavily, rolling his eyes.

"What do you want me to do? Call America and tell them I changed my mind?" Sam looked at Bucky with raised brows. He patted Buckys' back.

"Great reunion, buddy. (Y/N), visit whenever you want, don't wait for me." Sam said, giving your shoulder a squeeze.

"You had no right to give up that shield."

"This is what you're not gonna do. You're not gonna come here in your over-extended life and tell me about my rights. It's over, Bucky. Besides, I have bigger things to deal with." Sam faced Bucky. Bucky scoffed, brows furrowing slightly.

"What could be bigger than this?" He asked softly. Sam sighed, taking out his phone and clicking on a photo. He showed it to you and Bucky.

"This guy. He's leading rebel organizations all over the eastern Europe and he's strong... Too strong." Sam stared at you and Bucky, frowning. Bucky tore his gaze away from the photo to glance at you.

"Like.. Inhuman strong?" You asked.

"Yeah."

"And?" Bucky tilted his head as he watched Sam. Sam put his phone back in his pocket.

"He's been connected to this online group called The Flag-Smashers." Sam explained.

"Shitty name." You mumbled, earning a nod of agreement from Bucky. Sam cracked an amused smile.

"Redwing found him in a building so that's where I'm going." Sam shrugged lightly, going to step away.

"Well, I don't trust Redwing." Bucky called, following him. Sam stopped and looked at him again with slightly raised brows.

"You don't have to trust Redwing but I'm gonna go see if he's right cause I wanna find out if he's part of the big three." Sam replied. You furrowed your brows, tilting your head.

"Big three?" You repeated. Sam nodded, glancing between you and Bucky.

"What big three?"

"The big three. Androids, aliens, and wizards."

"That's not a thing." Bucky pointed out, staring at Sam in confusion. Sam scoffed.

"It most definitely is."

"No, it's not."

"Everytime we fight, we fight one of the three." You hummed in agreement, nodding.

"Who we fighting now? Gandalf?" Bucky asked, earning a surprised look from Sam.

"How do you know about Gandalf? How does he know about Gandalf?" Sam looked at you. You licked your lips, giving a slow shrug.

"I have no idea what you two are talking about." You replied. You couldn't help.but smile at their bickering. It was nice to have them back together. You knew Bucky hadn't responded to Sams' texts for multiple reasons but the main one was because he didn't know what to say to him.

"I read The Hobbit... In 1937 when it first came out." Bucky answered Sams question, a bit of smugness in his voice.

"So, you get my point."

"No, I don't. There are no wizards!"

"Doctor Strange? Wanda?" Sam raised his brows as he stared at Bucky.

"Sorcerers."

"A sorcerer is a wizard without a hat." Sam grinned, looking proud of himself. You chuckled softly.

"That's not the point. These guys aren't magical. They use brute force just like you, the incredibly annoying guy with a staring problem."

"That staring problem was what caught this guys' attention." Bucky motioned towards you. You bit back a smile, nodding.

"Yeah, kind of true." You giggled. You looked at Bucky, licking your lips.

"I should go. Please, don't get into trouble! I don't want a phone call from your therapist telling me you got arrested, alright?" You raised your brows at Bucky. Bucky nodded, leaning and kissing your temple.

"I promise I won't get arrested.."

"That's a goddamn lie." Sam muttered, walking towards a plane with Bucky following. You watched them walk away, hearing them faintly continue to bicker. You let out a deep sigh, turning around.

"And now onto Wanda."

[nevertheless-moving]

Suicidal Misunderstanding XXIII

Part I - - - - - - - - - Part XX - - - - Part XXI - - - - Part XXII

Star Wars Time Travel AU #27

The office was quiet but for the occasional shuffling of flimsi and tapping of datapads.

Bail Organa and Mon Mothma pointedly did not exchange a glance behind Padme’s back.

Senator Mothma set down her pad and broke the silence. “Padme...are you alright?” she asked softly.

“I’m fine Mon, let’s just go over the bill,” Padme responded stiffly.

Mothma hesitated. “That’s not the only reason I asked you here, Padme.”

Padme stood, chair scraping gratingly. “I see; I’ve already had the Chancellor pry me today in an attempt to exploit my ‘connections’ to the Jedi—as though they’re droids and not flesh-and-blood people who any average person could strike a friendship with—but I had thought better of you two; I suppose my faith was—”

“That’s not what I meant—” Mon pleaded.

“We’re concerned about you,” Bail insisted gently. “You don’t have to tell us anything about the Jedi that you don’t feel comfortable doing so.”

Padme paused, then reluctantly sat back down.

“My apologies,” she muttured. “It’s been...a long day. I’ve been asked by the Chancellor for help in breaking some news that...I’d rather not.”

The senators waited patiently for Padme to collect her thoughts. She rubbed the bridge of her nose. “General Kenobi has suffered from...force...I really don’t think there’s a way of saying this that doesn’t sound bad.”

“I had heard rumors that he was missing at meetings the last few days...has something serious happened?” Bail asked, concerned.

Padme shuddered. “This office is...”

“It’s clean,” Mothma confirmed quietly. “I have it checked independently anytime I’m gone for more then 15 minutes, with random deep-scans.”

“Would you mind...”

Mon nodded and the three waited in silence until the Chandurllian senator’s pad trilled the all-clear.

“Master Kenobi tried to kill himself earlier this week,” Padme confessed lowly. Mon straightened up in a sudden locking of knees and elbows, face drawn into tight lines. Bail’s hands flew to his mouth, tears forming.

“Knight Skywalker got to him in time, and he was in a coma until this morning when he apparently ‘ranted about ending the one’s responsible for the war’ and then vanished, along with Anakin.”

Mon grew very pale and Bail moved both hands from his mouth to his eyes.

“Fuck,” he said softly. “Just...fuck.”

Padme nodded in agreement and Mon inhaled deeply.

Bail rubbed way tears and straightened up resolutely. “How can we help?” he asked Padme. “How does the Chancellor want to handle releasing the news?”

She smiled weakly. “He’s leaving the exact wording up to me, but wants to make the announcement during the next full Senate gathering.”

“What!” Mon half-shouted, shocked. “There’ll be a riot! Surely a bulletin—even a press conference would be better for encouraging a moderate reaction—people will be shouting before he’s through the first sentence!”

“I know,” Padme agreed with a grimace. “But he wants ‘transparency.’“

“He wants panic,” Bail fumed.

“I’m trying to decide if it would better or worse to include the part about suicide,” Padme said bitterly. “Mental health breakdown and disappearance of the Republic’s highest General doesn’t leave much room for confidence or privacy.”

Mon clutched Padme’s hand in support. “I’ll have a PR team on standby. We can prepare resources for anyone who has questions, avoid conspiracy theories from spinning out. I already had a project on the backburner to put together own set of holoclips of the Jedi working towards peace—a counter to the ‘warmongering’ narrative, so to speak. It should be easy enough to adapt.”

“The Chancellor’s going to turn this into another military spending bill,” Bail predicted grimly. “We’ll make sure there’s a proviso in there to provide actual support for the Jedi in the field; I’ll make sure to get a legal team on viper in the grass duty as soon as the responses start coming out.”

“Thank you,” Padme said, gripping Mon’s hand over-tightly in return. She turned to the Alderannian senator. “I’m sorry Bail, I know you two are close.”

Bail exhaled slowly. “This war...I’ve seen Obi-Wan survive so much, and everytime he pulls off the impossible...”

“He’s rewarded with another burden on his shoulders,” Padme finished sympathetically. “Yes, I’ve been watching the same thing happen to Anakin. It’s—if the separatist movement hadn’t resolved into such a democratic and humanitarian nightmare—”

“You should go home and get some rest, Padme,” Mon urged. “It’s late, and the we’re all going to need to be sharp tomorrow. Who knows, maybe some new information will materialize before the afternoon.”

“Why Mon, that’s almost optimistic of you,” Bail remarked dryly.

Mon flashed him a wry grin, looking at Padme out of the corner of her eye. “Well. She did say Anakin with AWOL—”

“Oh do be quiet,” Padme huffed.

Despite the ever growing desire for sleep, it was another long hour before the Senator from Naboo departed. The pair were just turning to their seats after escorting Padme out when Bail let out a startled yelp; Mon instinctively kicked at the sudden small green blur.

Fortunately, when you’re green and the height of most humanoid’s knees, you become quite experienced at avoiding such reflexive 

“Master Yoda! What are you doing here? How did you even get in?” Senator Mothma staggered backwards, reverting to defensiveness to cover up her embarrassment at attempting to punt the Grandmaster of the Jedi Order.

“Has his ways, a Jedi does,” Yoda replied mysteriously. Mon Mothma nodded seriously as Bail restrained himself from rolling his eyes. He had spent far too much time around Obi-Wan for deliberate Jedi vagueness to hold much weight. 

“Can I—May I offer you a seat?” Mon asked, quickly recovering her diplomatic grace. “I’m afraid that you’ve just missed Senator Amidala, but I’m sure she would be eager to return; I understand she’s...concerned for Master Kenobi.”

The wizened Master shook his head, ears flopping as he hopped onto Padme’s recently vacated chair, standing on the cusioned seat as the two senators’ settled down. The sight should, perhaps, have been comical. But the weight of his gaze...Bail held his breath. Perhaps Jedi mystique did still have some affect on him.

“Come to speak with the two of you, I did. Missed Mistress Amidala, I have, I know. Deliberate, this was.”

Mon and Bail frowned, exchanging a slow look of pointed disapproval. Bail spoke hesitantly but with touch of reproach. “I’m certain she would prefer to be here, regardless of the news—Padme has suffered for her public defense of the Jedi, I should hope that that friendship is returned, especially in hard times”

Yoda’s ears drooped. “A great Jedi, she would have made, in another life. Vibrant, she is in the Force. Loud to a Jedi, regardless of sensitivity. But needed now, quiet is.” 

Yoda’s gaze pierced Bail and he warmed inexplicably. “Quiet the two of you are. Brilliant, wide but in the Force...” Yoda broke the gaze, growing contemplative.

“Unique in the force, each soul is. That can be read, rare is the mind. More difficult to discern, currents, intentions, manner, it is with some, it is with you. And now, Quiet we need.”

The two settled back, uneasily flattered. “Master Yoda—it’s an honor of course, to be considered an individual worthy of confidence, but why exactly do you have need of quiet minds? Of us?” Senator Mothma asked finally.

The diminutive Master sagged. “By actions you would do, trust you have earned. But always in motion, the future is. A heavy burden, to carry, I must ask you. Without cause, I would not ask. But once tell you this I do—” 

To the politicians shock Master Yoda’s simmed to glisten with unshed tears. “—Guarantee your safety I cannot.”

The air hung warm and heavy for a timeless moment and a chill ran up both their spines. But neither were individuals particularly given to indesicion in the face of looming danger. 

“How can we help?” Mon asked, the words echoing over far more than an hour. 

“We know something is wrong with Obi-Wan,” Bail added softly. “Whatever we can do to right it—Obi-Wan is a friend, the Jedi are our allies, and the Republic is our duty.”

Mon nodded firmly.

Yoda stared at them each in turn, eyes searching and ancient.

“Working with the Separatists, the Chancellor is,” he said bluntly. “Evidence of this, we have, but not proof. Controlling, the Separatists, the Chancellor is. Evidence of this we have also, but not proof. The truth it is.”

“Evidence?” Bail parroted hoarsely, mentally assembling his own grim circumstantial coronation even as his understanding of the conversation’s direction fell apart.

The Jedi Master drew two small glittering objects from his pocket—a datachip and a microslide. 

“In the brain of a trooper, this we found.” he said gravely. “In the brain of all clones, this lies. Orders, it contains. Evil, is it. Free will, it can control. Decode it we have. To the Chancellor, tied these orders are.”

“Force,” Mon murmured in horror, responding automatically. “He already controls the public, and the courts—”

“And over half the senate,” Bail added bitterly.

“A Sith, he is,” Yoda continued with a sigh. “A Sith he has always been. A return to an Empire, he aims.”

There was a long heady pause as the two grappled with the return of the ancient boogeyman of the Republic and the repeated derailing of their night’s direction. 

“Fuck,” Senator Mothma said delicately, thinking wistfully of two hours ago when she had planned on confronting Padme yet again on her relationship with a young Jedi.

“Said the same, did we.”

The Alderannian Senator rubbed his temples, trying to come to terms with consecutive massive shocks from the already unexpected conversation. “Is Obi-Wan alright?” he asked eventually.

The small Elder hummed thoughtfully in reply. Bail tensed.

“No and yes. Suffer much, he has. Broken he is, but not shattered. A plan he has. His idea to include you, it is. The bravest man in the galaxy, he called you.” Yoda said, offering Senator Organa a sad smile.

Bail leaned back, stunned. “Me? But—why me?” he asked bewildered.

“Know not, I do,” the Jedi said with a shrug. “Seen the future, he has. A future where saved his life, you did. Saved my life. Saved something too precious to name, you did. Matters little, it does. A future that must not come to pass, it is, even as learn from it. we do.”

“...I think you’re going to have to explain that somewhat,” Mon replied sternly as Bail’s head spun.

Yoda nodded and the three settled in for a sleepless night of planning treason.

Part XXIV

[melliflovs]

Chapter Two - Yuji x Reader

Word Count: 2,301

Warnings: Sukuna being Sukuna

Summary: A movie night with Megumi gets interrupted and training the next day with Yuji.

Series Masterlist Pinned!

You burst into Megumi's dorm room without knocking, throwing Nanami's freshly dry cleaned suit over the back of a chair. "You'll never guess why I was summoned earlier." You said, walking over to your friend who sat on his bed. His eyes lifting from his phone, the black haired boy's thumb only pausing the repetitive scrolling for a moment.

"What?" He deadpanned before resuming whatever he was doing on his phone. "Well," You said sighing loudly. "I am now partners with the one and only Yuji Itadori, effective immediately."

Megumi looked up at you in confusion, eyebrows knitted together. "Why would Gojo want that?" You sat down beside him on the small bed.

"Beats me." You shrugged. "But," You began, a shit eating grin lighting up your face. "A certain King of Curses thinks I'm hot."

Megumi's arm shot out towards you shoving you lightly, "That not funny, don't joke about that."

You scoffed at him "What, do you think I'm not pretty enough for Sukuna or something? Besides I wasn't joking." You got up from beside him, admittedly slightly annoyed at his reaction. The dorms were small but each one had a cupboard for a small amount of food storage. You walked over to it and grabbed a bag of unpopped popcorn.

"So you're telling me that Sukuna - the baddest of the bad has his eyes on you now?" He said in disbelief, following you around the small room.

"Does it really matter? He's not the one in control anyways." You said reaching down to pull out the microwave you hid in the closet. Something you could only hope would never be found by a teacher. Potential fire hazard and all. You plugged the microwave into the wall before putting the popcorn in. You turned back to Megumi as the soft popping sound began.

"Yes it matters, he's dangerous. Itadori doesn't know what he's doing yet-" He was cut off by a loud thud a shout sounding from the room next to you.

"What was that." You asked, the room going silent aside from the microwave in the background. Together the two of you listened carefully, ears practically pressed up against the wall. A few seconds passed and you'd heard nothing. "That was weird-"

"Ow!" The two of you stilled, looking at each other with wide eyes.

"Whos next door?" You whispered.

Megumi straightened out as a lightbulb when off in his head. "Yuji is."

The two of your ripped out of the dorm room, running the short way to his door as the pained cries continued. "Should I," You gestured to yourself, "Do the thing?" He finished for you "No of course not I'll just break down the door."

"What?! That's so unnecessary I can just unlock it, you idiot." You continued to bicker back and forth for a moment, not realizing that the sounds had stopped. The two of you froze as the door in front of you began to open. Yuji stepped out, a confused look on his face and a sleeping cursed doll in his hand.

"Is everything okay?" He asked, looking between you and Megumi.

"Uh, yeah. We just heard some strange sounds and got worried-" You watched in shock as the corpse in his hands woke up, immediately turning towards the boy holding it and punching him.

"Fuck!" He yelled, holding the doll as far away from his body as possible - a small red bump rising by his temple.

Megumi burst out laughing, his arms clutching his sides. You stared wide eyed at your friend, possibly more shocked by his reaction than by the abusive toy. "Gojo's making me practice control." Yuji began to explain, "I'm watching some movies if you guys want to join."

"No, it's okay. Just wanted to make sure you were safe." You responded, sending a soft smile his way as you watched the puppet's chest rise and fall with every breath while it slept.

"Are you sure?" A deeper voice asked, a mouth popping out of the back of Yuji's hand, "I'm sure you'd have a good time." It tempted. Megumi stiffened beside you, stepping forward to get in between you and the cursed boy. Itadori was still very much in control but Sukuna's words irked Megumi.

"What's wrong, Spikes." He toyed, pulling at Megumi's patience. "Am I flirting with your girl? I bet she'd enjoy herself more with us."

Yuji frowned, still holding the animated puppet away from his body. He knew that fighting with Sukuna would only encourage him in the long run, even if it upset his fellow students. At least they didn't have to hear everything he said, constantly speaking in his head.

"I dunno, Sukuna." You said, "Megumi sure knows how to make the bed rock."

Flabbergasted your friend looked down trying to hide his blush. It wasn't true, none of it was. But you figured that if you were going to have to deal with the unwelcomed spirit's chatter then you would at least have fun with it.

"Oh?" Sukuna asked, "You two don't make a very cute couple. Why do the hottest girls always pick the ugliest guys." He mused.

Out of the corner of your eyes, you watched Megumi's hands raise, subtly beginning to summon his shikagami. Your own hands shot out, grabbing him and stopping his actions. "Ya know what, it was really great catching up with you Sukuna but I have a bag of popcorn just calling my name." You smiled, trying to cover up what almost could've happened. The mouth pouted momentarily before disappearing. Satisfied you nodded goodbye to a clearly humiliated Yuji and walked back to Megumi's door, pulling him along with you.

You waited before the two of you were securely behind the wooden door before turning back to your friend. "What were you thinking out there?!" You tried to keep your voice down but quickly found yourself failing. "You could've been badly hurt or, or even killed, Megumi."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you." He rebutted, "Sukuna isn't safe, Itadori isn't safe. You shouldn't be working with him."

"You're not getting the point. Sukuna doesn't seem to care about anything that's happening right now. He's content with his vessel. What would've pissed him off is getting your dogs to attack Yuji, why would you even try that to begin with."

Megumi exhaled loudly, his anger disappearing as his shoulders deflated. "I didn't like how he was speaking to you." You shook your head at him, your own anger fleeting.

"I can handle myself. You know that."

"Yeah," He nodded, "I do know that. He should treat you better though." You walked up to him, leaning forward and resting your head on his chest. You let out a soft sigh.

"The most powerful curse known to man is living inside the body of one of our new classmates. He can say whatever he wants to me as long as it keeps everyone safe, including you." You lifted your head to look at Megumi. "So please," You stressed, "Don't do anything to upset him."

"I won't."

In truth, you didn't really believe him. Megumi was stubborn and above all would do anything to protect you. But you were a big girl now, you could hold your own. Regardless you smiled at him and put it aside, "Thank you."

Pushing yourself off his chest you turned back to the microwave, your slightly cold popcorn waiting patiently for you to eat it. "Now, what movie are we watching tonight?"

He shrugged, "Up to you."

"Maybe I should go ask Yuji for some movie recommendations." You teased, wiggling your eyebrows at Megumi. "I bet Gojo gave him a great selection."

"Yeah," He scoffed, "If you like Jennifer Lawrence."

"What are you talking about?" Sure you liked her as much as the average person but his comment caught you off guard.

"Ah, it's a guy thing." He said nonchalantly, "You wouldn't get it."

You rolled your eyes, grabbing your popcorn and striding over to his bed. "Well, are we watching a movie or not."

Megumi finally joined you as the smell of butter invaded his senses, sitting beside you and pulling out his laptop. It'd take time but eventually, you'd be able to agree on something to watch. Even if it took all night.

---

You woke up the next morning to your phone buzzing on the bedside table beside you. Without looking you answered it, worried the sound would wake the boy sleeping on the floor next to you. "Hello?" Your voice was groggy as you let out a small yawn still tired from the movie marathon the night before.

"You're late."

The sound of Nanami's voice on the end of the line made your eyes widen. You were so screwed. "Sorry, Sensei. I-" You heard a soft beep as he hung up the call. Quickly you threw the covers off yourself, careful not to wake Megumi as you grabbed your things and tugged a sweatshirt on over your pajamas.

Making your exit you quietly closed the door. Megumi was many things but he was most definitely not a morning person and the last thing you needed to deal with was the wrath of two men so early in the morning. Sprinting through the dorm hallways you made your way down the staircase and towards the gym. When you finally made it to your destination you stood outside for a moment, taking a deep breath. The last time you were late he'd made you run a lap for every second you'd missed. You were five minutes late.

Three hundred laps.

But Nanami never used the same punishment twice, which now led to an internal panic. It could be anything his brain could think of.

Trying your best to now calm yourself you were at least ten minutes late. The latest you'd ever been, but hopefully you wouldn't get hurt too bad when it was all said and done. Fearfully you pushed past the gym doors quickly spotting your mentor and Itadori.

How could you have forgotten the events of the day before? In the rush to wake up and get to training in time it'd completely slipped your mind that it wasn't just you and Nanami anymore. The sound of the door closing made both of the men turn towards you. Yuji's eyes quickly meeting yours as you walked towards them, slipping your shoes off.

Suddenly you felt oddly aware of the boy's attention, beginning to regret your wardrobe choice of leggings and a wrinkled hoodie. You bailed so fast from Megumi's room that you hadn't even stopped to look in front of a mirror, let alone wash your face or brush your teeth. Grimacing internally you attempted to brush it off - to ignore it. Being a sorcerer wasn't about your appearance or presentation it was about skill and techniques.

At least if Yuji did notice how bad you looked he was nice enough not to mention it, turning back towards his new mentor as you went to stand beside him.

"Finally." Nanami huffed, "You've decided to grace us with your presence."

"Did ya miss me 'Nami. It's only been a few hours, couldn't stand to live without me, huh?" He sent a glare your way, if looks could kill you'd be six feet under. Yuji snickered quietly beside you, trying not to get on his new teachers bad side.

"Today we're practicing teamwork. Something that you aren't great at, (y/n)." Now it was your turn to send a glare his way. "I'm fantastic at it. I don't know what you could be talking about."

"Where should I begin? Maybe the time you shoved Megumi into a room of curses as a prank? Or the time that you got Nobara so annoyed that she almost struck you with her nails? I think she still has that locket of your hair, maybe I should call her up-"

"Hey, hey, we get the picture I'm not as funny as I think I am." You grumbled, shifting on your feet. In your defense, it was a room of fly heads and Nobara was just easy to piss off. You weren't exactly expecting her to try to kill you though. It was all water under the bridge.

"Now," Your mentor continued, "I've been told there's a grade two curse at a nearby school. Tomorrow we will go and exorcise it, but today you need to get to know each other." You and Yuji turned towards each other, eyeing one another apprehensively. "But, you may under no circumstances share your cursed techniques. That will be discovered in time.

"Shucks, how will he ever know how special I am." Another glare from Nanami was enough to shut you up, maybe you should stop pushing it for now.

"I'll see you guys later."

"What?" Yuji asked, eyebrows furrowed as he looked at the blonde man. "You're just leaving us like that?"

"Yes. Is there a problem?" Nanami questioned, pulling his glasses down slightly to look directly at Itadori.

"Can't say I have a problem with being alone with (y/n)"

You let out a soft groan when you heard the deeper voice. You didn't even need to look to know that Sukuna was now talking. Your sensei, now clearly annoyed just walked away leaving the two of you - technically three of you alone in the gym.

"So.... Jennifer Lawrence?" You said, attempting to break the somewhat awkward silence.

Sukuna started laughing from Yuji's hand as his cheeks turned red, "Who told you that?"

"I never reveal my secrets." You teased at the obviously embarrassed boy. "Well if we just have to get to know each other wanna go get something to eat? I never got a chance to eat breakfast."

"Yeah." Yuji grinned, "Let's go."

[shuahoonie]

holidays with tom [tom holland]

PAIRING: tom holland x female!reader 

SUMMARY: life isn’t exactly back to normal. with another lockdown in place and the holiday season is vastly approaching, you and tom are stuck in quarantine with each other the problem? there was supposed to be at least 5 of you in that house and tom is the last person you want to be with. shouldn’t be too bad right? 

WARNINGS: in no particular order swearing—err foul language lmao, sexual innuendos, things get heated but not that much??? exuding sexual tension but also fluff??? alcohol consumption, a series of bad decisions??? idk writing this made me experience the 5 stages of grief tbh lmao it’s not that bad I promise lmao

WORD COUNT: 6.9k! 

A/N: hello and happy new year! I was supposed to post this during Christmas Day but guess who got into a writing rut—yet again. I didn’t want to abandon this because I actually had fun writing it. I hope you all had a festive and safe holiday. I know things have been hard but I still hope you guys enjoyed the holiday. 

2020 has finally came to an end and we’re all ending it the same way when the pandemic started—staying at home, hopefully following the appropriate health measures. I can only hope that 2021 is a brighter and hopeful year for all of us.

stay safe, sending u all my love. 

gif credits: @underoos-shield​ 

vanessa’s masterlist | taglist form 

Two hours. It’s been two hours since you found out that you were going to spend your holidays alone. You were aware that you weren’t going to spend your holidays with your family as you normally would, embracing the fact that working in a different country whilst in the middle of a pandemic was going to be challenging. 

Working in the film industry, constantly visiting sets while still living in a pandemic means that you threw away your chances of being home for the holidays. However, you weren’t entirely the only one who shares a similar struggle. 

“We should still do something for Christmas, you know,” Tom muttered as he watched you lay down on the sofa, your head is supported by the armrest. 

See—it should’ve been you, Ophelia, Alex, William, and Tom in that AirBnB, not just you and Tom.

The five of you reside abroad, however, you all had to fly to Los Angeles for work. You all collectively knew that it would be irresponsible to fly home for the holidays and it wouldn’t make any sense as you would all fly back for work anyway. 

The five of you had a brilliant idea of renting an AirBnB for the holidays since you were all in each other’s personal and work bubble anyway. Obviously, the three of them bailed as they’ve decided to stay with their partners instead, leaving you and Tom alone—which is the last thing you’ve wanted. 

“There’s just us two, Tom,” You replied as you sent a lengthy text to Ophelia, telling and reminding them about what happened between you and Tom.  “I’m not entirely sure if it’s worth anything if we did plan on doing something remotely festive.” 

There are four more days till Christmas and if you were being honest, the last time you felt festive was on the 18th of December...of 2019. 

“Surely there’s something we can do, right?” Tom’s optimism still shined beneath him. “This year has already been shitty enough, we don’t need to feed more into that.” 

The three dots bubble immediately popped up on your message thread with Ophelia as soon as you sent your passive-aggressive rant. Your focus was now on your phone. 

Suddenly, Tom’s face appeared on top of yours—his face was definitely close enough that it’s not CDC approved. He was standing on side of the sofa, both of his palms planted against the armrest as he loomed over you. 

“What do you and your family do during Christmas?” He dared to ask as if he wasn’t towering over you.

Your eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. “Uh—give each other personal space?” You answered out of sheer reflex. You always had a problem with keeping your mouth shut, especially when it sounds rude to other people. In your defence, being unable to do so has helped you put people back in place. 

To be fair, you were used to people standing at least 6 ft away from you ever since the pandemic started. 

Tom’s cheeks went bright red. “’m sorry,” He apologized, giving you a shy smile and scratched the back of his neck. You muttered a quick apology too, for acting so rashly. 

You rose from your position and sat upright instead. “Well, we never do anything special during Christmas,” You said as you threw your hair into a bun. “We usually just go to the movies on Christmas Day because that’s the only thing you can do back when life was normal.” 

Tom nodded understandingly as if he was taking this into account. Now you were curious. 

“Do you guys do anything special for Christmas?” You asked him. 

“Well, on Christmas Day, we would usually just lounge around the house and use it as a chance for me and my family to catch up,” Tom replied. “However, on Christmas Eve, my mum always made sure my brothers and I would have this scavenger hunt to look for our gifts—It’s really fun, actually.” Tom smiled sadly. 

You could easily see how Tom was genuinely broken about not being able to be around his family over the holidays. Heck—he really just misses his family. But who wouldn’t? Britney Spears didn’t sing the line “my loneliness is killing me” for nothing. 

“I’m sorry,” was all you could say. Aside from biting your tongue, being able to easily comfort people was one of your weaknesses too. 

“Oh, there’s nothing to be sorry about, darling.” Tom quickly dismissed the genuine heartbreak he was trying to hide. “We’re all making sacrifices and we chose to be responsible for the benefit of other people.” 

“Yeah, I know.” You said softly. “We’ll just try our best to make something out of this holiday season. I mean—we have to or else we’ll welcome 2021 with a fresh face of misery.” 

“I’m sorry!” Ophelia pouted at the screen as they mindlessly walked around their partner’s place, something that most people do when they’re on the phone with someone. “I genuinely forgot about what happened between you and Tom.” 

“Well, Ollie, it seems like you weren’t the only one.” You replied, adjusting your glasses. Tom seems to be genuinely fine around you, no awkward tensions or anything. If anything, it’s just you who feels weird around him. “But I guess that’s a good thing right?” 

Ophelia forced a smile but they couldn’t, for the life of them, say anything about it. 

“Oh my god,” You sighed “Seriously, Ollie?” 

“It’s just—how could he forget?! You were literally on top of him as I recall and that very much left a permanent image on my mind. I—You know, I really tried my best to forget that ever existing in my mind. So really, if anything, it’s your fault.” Ophelia rambled on. 

“I—I wasn’t on top of him. That’s absurd! I was merely pressed against him” You said defensively, in which Ophelia just laughed atrociously. “Why am I friends with you again?!” You asked rhetorically, bewildered by the fact that you two lasted this long. 

“First of all, that is a hate crime. Second, I’m cool—like everyone wants to be my friend and you should be glad that I gave you the privilege to be even on a nickname basis as me.” 

You rolled your eyes at them. Despite the never-ending banter, you were grateful to have Ophelia as your friend. 

“But seriously, Y/N,” Ophelia said, “You can always just stay with me and Ericka. She’ll be glad to have you over for the holidays.”

“Ollie, as much as I love spending time with you two—I can’t stand being a third-wheel, especially when it comes to the both of you. You two are inseparable when you’re together.” You replied. “I appreciate the offer though.” You smiled at her. 

“I’m just saying—” Ophelia replied, shrugging her shoulder. “Unless you and Tom really want to have the house by yourselves.” They sang teasingly.

“Ophelia!” You gasped. 

“What?” They feigned innocence. “I gave you an option to stay with us! Plus, I know Alex and Will are would’ve asked you to stay with them if they had any idea what happened between you two.” 

“I can’t leave him!” You started to whisper “Tom seems genuinely bummed being here. I can’t just do that to him.” 

It’s as if a light came on inside them. Ophelia started to smirk and you recognized that smirk from anywhere. For christ’s sake, their eyes twinkled like Christmas lights. It drove you nuts. “I fucking knew it.” 

“What?” 

“You like him don’t you?!” They teased, but all you could do was blush. 

“I do not!” You denied it as you could still feel the burning heat emitting from your cheeks. 

“His tongue is that good huh?” Ophelia decided to pry even further. They clearly find enjoyment as you squirmed your way out of this conversation. 

“Bitch, I am ending this call.” That was all you could say. Even if you did find a smart retort, it was no use, especially with Ophelia. They can see right through you and there’s no point in trying to hide it. 

“Honestly, Y/N, we’re living through a pandemic. If there’s any time to make any rash decisions, it’s now. Go get that dick, bih—” 

You drowned out whatever Ophelia was trying to say with your goodbyes and proceeded to end the call. The one time you asked your friend to be serious and they come up with this. 

So—what really happened with you and Tom? 

It was two years ago. You were at a party that you didn’t even plan on attending. However, you were dragged by Ophelia and their partner, Ericka—your new friends in the area. You couldn’t say no to them, they were your first friend in LA! 

You thought about it though, saying no. But when you got a message from your friend back in Canada sending a photo of your boyfriend ex-boyfriend (the same guy who had ghosted you ever since you moved to LA), swapping spits with another girl, you suddenly had the strong urge to drink until you die of alcohol poisoning.

You were burning with anger that you really felt tears pricking your eyes. You were so close to crying or punching someone—whichever comes first.  

One thing’s for sure, though, you weren’t going to cry over a man. So what did you do? “Ophelia, where’s the booze?!” You asked your friend whose eyes nearly popped out of their head. 

Well, you weren’t really going to punch a stranger. Though you felt this burning sense of violence, it’d be much more satisfying to punch the living daylights out on your ex. 

“Y/N, honey, are you alright?” That line always puts on the waterworks, no?  Ophelia was clearly concerned about your newfound thirst for alcohol. 

You furiously wiped the tears off your face. “Um just found out my boyfriend—er ex-boyfriend, who stopped talking to me as soon as I moved here, is seeing someone else now? I don’t know, am I allowed to feel angry when I don’t even know if we’re still together as soon I moved? Fuck—” You tried to explain as you wiped every tear that left your eyes. 

“Oh—of course, hon.” Ericka who handed you a drink. You weren’t exactly sure what it is, but you knew it has alcohol in it and that’s all that matters. You gulped the entire thing and you wanted more. “Y/N, you need to slow down.”

“Are you sure you want to stay? I mean we can crash at our place, eat take-outs, watch movies and be totally disconnected from the world.” Ophelia suggested, but you shook your head furiously. 

“No, I—I’m ok.” You answered “I can’t let the both of you be stuck in misery with me. I need this. I’ll get drunk and if I'm up for it, I’ll hook up with someone. It’s not a healthy coping method but I really want this night to be a series of bad decisions. I don’t want to be myself, even just tonight.”

 So that’s what you did. You were going from one drink to another in record time. Both Ophelia and Ericka kept an eye on you, just in case someone tried to take advantage of your drunken state. 

You were talking to some guy you met in the kitchen, one thing led to another and next thing you knew, you were making out with this dude in someone’s bathroom. Ophelia and Ericka were drunk enough to pester the guy you were making out with but not drunk 

As you were propped on top of the sink and your legs wrapped around his waist, you felt every bit of his lips explore the side of your neck as his hands explored every inch of your body. With his hand under your shirt and his fingers tracing every part of your skin, it just reminded you of how lonely you were. 

Here you were, a thousand miles away from home, all alone just so you could do the one thing you really love. Your family would sometimes call to check up on you but it just wasn’t the same. Your ex tried to guilt you into staying in Canada, but you couldn’t do that. You love what you do and you love yourself too. 

You were willing to risk everything, even if happiness came at a price. 

Now you were crying, and the guy you were making out with definitely noticed. 

“I’m sorry, am I making you uncomfortable?” He asked as he pulled down your shirt. 

“No—no, I’m just—” You tried to calm yourself down. “I’m not sure if I want to do this anymore.” 

“That’s alright,” He mumbled wiping the tears off your face. “Do you want to talk about it? You seem rattled.” 

“It’s just I’m so tired of pretending everything is alright—that I’m okay being alone, that I don’t need anyone. But it’s just so hard because I’m—” You sobbed “I’m so fucking lonely. I’m so tired of being alone.” 

The guy tucked the stray piece of hair behind your ears as he carefully wiped your tears with his thumb. He was just silent as he listened to you sob. 

“I’m sorry, I know you definitely didn’t come to this party to watch a complete stranger cry over something stupid.” You couldn’t even look him in the eye, you were embarrassed as this was the first time you felt really vulnerable—especially in front of a stranger. 

“No, you’re alright.” He tried to console you “I think that’s the beauty in strangers, no? You can act and do whatever you want in front of them because there’s a slim chance you’ll ever see them again.” 

You were definitely drunk enough that trying to make sense of who the person was a struggle enough of itself. You tried your best to look at the guy but your vision was getting hazy and you could feel your head thumping that focusing made you feel like you want to crack your head in half. 

A loud knock on the door caused you two to jump. “I’m coming in,” Ophelia yelled and opened the door. Ophelia looked at the guy for a while, trying to make sense of who he was before their eyes widened. “I remember now—You’re Tom Holland.”

Imagine your surprise when you found out that you were going to work with Tom Holland for a while. You tried your best to avoid Tom at work but of course, that didn’t work out. He never brought up what happened between you two and you assumed he probably forgot all about it.

You tried to rationalize that he meets a lot of people every day. Surely, one failed hook-up wasn’t worth remembering (especially with alcohol involved) and you held on to that. 

At least that’s what makes you sleep at night and also one of the reasons why you considered spending the holidays with him. However, you were also expecting your crew friends to stay with you and not just Tom. 

“Y/N, did you like the gift? It’s from me and Ericka!” Ophelia asked. It was the next day and you two were just chatting on FaceTime. You were sorting out your closet out of sheer boredom. You figured if you were going to stay here for three weeks, the least you could do was sort your clothes out. 

You stared at the neatly wrapped box that Ophelia and Ericka dropped off earlier this morning. “I haven’t opened it yet.” You said as you showed them the box. “I wanna open it till Christmas.” 

“Oh my god, just open it. Christmas doesn’t exist this year, babe.” Ophelia waved their hand, encouraging you to open it. 

“Fine,” You gave in. You opened the box and saw a very lush and well-made lingerie set. “Ophelia, what the fuck” You gasped. You held out the lingerie in front of the camera. 

“Y/N, I definitely outdid myself this time.” Ophelia sighed happily, staring at the screen. “Try it on!”

“Ollie, this is gorgeous but when am I ever going to use this?” You asked holding it out on your body and looking at the mirror. 

“Uh—you’re stuck at home with your failed but also potential hookup,” Ollie suggested, wiggling their eyebrows. “Who knows what might happen?”  

You rolled your eyes at them. “Bold of you assume that something might happen.”

“Something won’t happen if you don’t try that one,” Ophelia said. “C’mon, I wanna see.” 

You shook your head and went out of frame in order to strip off your clothes. You tried on the lingerie—it’s a black lace teddy with a very exposing back. IT fit you perfectly—it accentuated your figure and definitely showed off your boobs. You weren’t really fond of showing off your body but you still tried your best to show it to your friend. 

“What do you think?” You asked, stepping back to the frame. 

“You look gorgeous, babe!” Ophelia squealed. “I knew I made the right choice with black.” 

“I still don’t know where I should wear this though—” You were stopped mid-sentence when your door swung open. 

“I know what we’re doing this—Oh shit. I’m so sorry,” Tom stood there, frozen, his eyes widened and immediately shut the door. 

You couldn’t even say anything. You were frozen in shock.

“Was that Tom?” Ophelia asked from the call, briefly forgetting that you were talking to them through FaceTime. 

You nodded slowly, unable to talk.

“What did he think?” Ophelia asked excitedly. 

You snapped out of this haze. “Ollie,” you groaned. “I think he was mentally scarred. 

“What do you mean scarred? You look great!” Ophelia said, appalled. “If he doesn’t think you look banging in that lingerie then it’s his loss.” 

“I gotta go, I need to change.” You said, bidding Ophelia goodbye. “Thanks for the gift, Ollie. Tell Ericka thanks too.” 

You ended the call and changed into comfier clothes. You couldn’t help but wonder how on earth you’re going to face Tom now that he’s seen you practically naked. Well, it’s not like that’s a new sight. He did see you with your bra on when you were making out in the bathroom that one time. But still! 

Are you actually going to spend your Christmas in your room?

It was the next day and there are only two more days till Christmas. You spent the entirety of last night in your room after the incident between you and Tom. 

You were about to make yourself some coffee when you found Tom in the kitchen, making tea for himself. You stood there frozen, wondering if you were going to proceed to the kitchen or just run back to your room since Tom hasn’t noticed you—

“Oh—good morning, Y/N.” So close. 

You smiled at Tom and said, “Good morning, Tom.” 

You grabbed a coffee pod and waited for the Keurig to make your coffee. You leaned back against the counter and fiddled with your phone—all in the hopes that things move quickly and for this awkward tension to be over. 

Honestly, why were you so worked up about it? People have seen you in a bikini before and that’s no different from lingerie. If anything, lingerie is itchier and has lace. You should be able to feel confident in your own body and you shouldn’t have to mind what other people think of it. It’s yours alone and it’s your opinion that should matter—

“I’m terribly sorry about last night, Y/N.” Tom apologized, sincerity was written all over his face. “I should’ve knocked and I just got so bloody excited about what we can do over Christmas—but that’s no excuse for what I’ve done. What I did was incredibly intrusive and you deserve a proper apology.”

“Tom, I—”

“I wanted to apologize last night—over dinner—but you didn’t come down to eat, so I figured you didn’t want to talk. “ He rambled on. 

“Tom—” 

“But even then I should’ve asked you to come down and eat dinner because that’s what any decent human would do! And yet I didn’t. God—I’m just doing one wrong thing after another—” 

“Tom, listen to me.” 

“Hm?” He finally snapped out and looked at you in the eyes. 

“It’s okay. It was an honest mistake and you sincerely apologized, and for me, that’s enough.” You smiled softly at him. “So—what’s this thing you planned over Christmas?” 

“I was thinking we could do both our family traditions over the next two days. My family and I usually do a roast dinner and open our Christmas stockings on Christmas Eve. Then on the 25th, we can watch movies all day just like you do with your family.” Tom grinned, clearly satisfied with his plan. “What do you think?”

“I think it’s a great idea,” You smiled “However, I don’t think we have any ingredients for a roast dinner and we don’t really have Christmas stockings. Well—I don’t have any Christmas stockings and stocking stuffers.” 

“That’s true,” Tom mumbled “But I have to do the food shopping anyway. We’re running low on food and I couldn't really book one of those online delivery things that most groceries now offer.” 

You nodded. “Okay, so I guess I have to get the house sorted then.” 

When you two first arrived in this AirBnB a few days ago, it had already been decorated for Christmas. It had a massive tree in the living room decorated with stunning and intricately-themed ornaments. Christmas garlands were wrapped around the stair-bannisters and foliages were placed by the fireplace and the tables. 

All you really had to do was clean the place—do a bit of vacuuming and get things nice and neat for Christmas. It didn’t take you too long to do it too. It had only been a couple of minutes since Tom left to do the food shopping and you prayed to the gods that he doesn’t get too much attention whilst out. 

You figured you might as well do some last-minute shopping while Tom was out, so you can grab gifts for him as well. After all, this whole thing was orchestrated by Tom and you don’t even have anything to give him for his stockings. 

You arrived at your AirBnB a tad later than Tom. He was in the kitchen putting things away when he saw you walk through the door. 

“Ah, I was wondering whether I spooked you with my plan,” Tom commented, making you chuckle and roll your eyes. 

“Trust me, I would’ve made it very obvious if you did.” You replied, earning a laugh from Tom. “I went out to do my last-minute shopping. Granted, it’s not ideal since we’re still living through a pandemic, but there’s not actually that many people where I went to considering it’s the Christmas rush.” 

You made sure to hide the stuff you bought using the handmade tote bags that a friend gave you for your birthday. No retail bags, no clue. “How did you survive the groceries? I bet it’s busy out there.” 

“Yeah, it was.” Tom chuckled, scratching the back of his head. “Remind me to never do that again for Christmas.” 

“Sure,” You said, “That is if I spend another Christmas with you.” You said jokingly, hoping that Tom didn’t find that rude. 

“You’ll never know,” Tom shrugged. “What if you liked our Christmas this year and you’d be begging to spend Christmas with me and my family in London,” Tom smirked, playing along. 

“Yeah, right.” You scoffed playfully, crossing your arms. “If anyone’s begging, it’s going to be you.”

Tom stepped closer, “Wanna bet?” He whispered, a teasing look in his eyes. “Whoever has the most fun during our respective holiday traditions would have to spend the holidays with them next year.” 

“Oh, you’re on, Holland.” You took a step closer. “We will both film our holidays for the entire two days and then we’ll ask Ophelia, Alex, and Will to vote whoever looks like they had the most fun.”

“Okay,” Tom nodded “But no editing! We’ll give them raw footage so there are no chances of tampering.” 

You laughed but you agreed anyway. “Of course, we’ll give them hours of footage. The least we could do is make them sit through hours of content after they ditched us all alone on the holidays.” 

Tom gave a broad smile. “Let the festivities begin.” 

It was the 24th of December—Christmas Eve. You spent the entirety of last night wrapping Tom’s presents for later. Not that you despise Christmas, but it’s been a while since you were actually excited to celebrate it. It was pretty clear that the magic of Christmas dies once you grow up. 

Today was different; you were looking forward to whatever Tom has installed for tonight. 

You went downstairs to make some breakfast only to be greeted by Tom blasting Christmas music and preparing some ingredients for breakfast in the kitchen. 

“Good morning, Y/N, happy Christmas Eve,” Tom greeted with a huge grin. “Say, hi to the camera.” 

“Oh, we’re starting this early, huh?” You asked, putting your hair into a loose ponytail. 

“Why of course, we have to make the best out of this,” Tom said, holding the camera to your face. “I made you coffee.” Tom handed you a cup of coffee. 

“Are you using my love for coffee as an advantage?” You tried to hide your smile while drinking your coffee. 

“Obviously not,” Tom feigned his innocence. “I obviously did not know you were obsessed with coffee—it’s not like I don’t see you on set without one.” He mumbled in which you definitely heard, giving him a smack on the head. “Ow! I’m kidding.” He laughed.

You rolled your eyes at him. “So, what’s for breakfast?” 

“We’re going to make french crèpes,” Tom replied and propped the camera on the kitchen island, facing the two of you. 

“Do you know how to make french crèpes?” You asked, washing your hands. 

Tom blinked, almost trying to decide whether he wants to be honest or impressive. “Do you know how to make french crèpes?” He returned the question. 

“Oh honey, my mom resents me in the kitchen.” You replied, taking a sip from your coffee. “But you know, I manage.” You murmured.

“That’s giving me a lot of hope, darling, thank you.” He said half-heartedly. 

“Shut up,” You nudged him playfully, rolling your eyes. “Tom, honestly, most of the footage is just us bantering for 20 minutes.” 

“To be fair, that’s part of the fun.” Tom smiled. “Okay, I think you just mix all of these in a bowl. Start with the dry ingredients first.” He said, looking at the recipe on his phone.

“Okay, that shouldn’t be too hard,” You commented pouring the ingredients into the bowl. As you started all of the ingredients together, you noticed small lumps forming in the batter. “Tom, did you sift the dry ingredients by chance?” 

“You were supposed to sift it?” He asked, completely clueless. 

You nodded slowly. Panic was now clearly painted on his face. “I’m sure we’ll be fine.” You tried to reassure him. 

It was not fine. The first time you two tried to pour the batter in the pan, you burnt the entire thing. It’s not even the cute, lightly burnt crepe. It was activating the smoke alarm-burnt crepe. 

The next one was pancake-like. The next one after that had pocket flours on the crepes because you two didn’t sift your dry ingredients beforehand. You ran out of the batter when you two finally got the consistency right—you managed to get one proper crepe from the entire batter. 

“I feel like Sam would probably curse me out as soon as he finds out I fucked up a simple crepe,” Tom said, delicately filling the crepe with creme and berries. “My brother’s done so well in culinary school.” He cut a piece with his fork and brought it to your mouth.

“Well, you can’t have everything.” You said taking a bite out of the crepe. “This is better than the last one.” 

Tom nodded, taking a bite of it himself. “It’s not as tasty as Sam’s but I’ll take it.” 

“Now, I’m curious as to what your brother’s cooking tastes like.” You commented taking another bite from the crepe. 

“I guess I’ll just take you home to London to find out,” Tom teased with an annoying grin. 

“As long as I’m being fed, I’m fine with it.” You remarked. What in god’s name are you are you two playing?!

The day rolled by very quickly. It was already evening when you finished wrapping the presents for your friends. You plan on dropping it off tomorrow before you persuade Tom to glue yourselves on the couch for the entire day. 

You grabbed all of Tom’s gifts—Christmas stocking included— when you went downstairs, only to be greeted by someone yelling at Tom through his phone. 

“I did everything right, Sam. I don’t know why you’re yelling.” Tom yelled back at his phone. His back was turned against you as he was putting away the pots and pans that he used. 

You quietly walked up behind him and said calmly, “Why are you yelling?” 

Tom probably jumped six feet away from you, making you laugh. You always forget that he gets scared easily. “Holy shit, don’t scare me like that, Y/N.” Tom breathed out, putting a hand over his chest. 

“I’m sorry,” You said whilst laughing. “I promise I won’t do it again.” Tom rolled his eyes, murmuring something about you being insincere about it. 

“Please do it again!” You heard, whom you assume is Sam, say from the background. You looked at Tom’s phone that’s propped on the island and saw his brothers on FaceTime. 

You beamed at them. “Any recommendations?” You asked, hearing Tom groan behind you. 

“Well, he hates—” 

“This is the last thing I want in 2020, for my brothers and Y/N to conspire against me,” Tom said loudly on purpose, drowning his brothers' voices.

“Tom, don’t be rude. Let your brothers finish—” Tom put his hand against your mouth. 

“I’ll call you guys later,” Tom said “Wave goodbye, Y/N.” He used his free hand to grab your hand and forced a wave towards his brothers. The call soon came to an end and you could only roll your eyes at Tom. You seem to do that a lot around him. You also do a lot of that when you try to hide your feelings towards a person you like but that’s beside the point. 

“So are we going to have dinner first or are we going to do presents first?” You asked fixing your Christmas sweater, a gift from your parents since you and your family usually wear matching sweaters for Christmas. “Or are you the type to wait until Christmas Day to open presents?” 

“We can do the Christmas stockings after dinner tonight, then do the presents tomorrow, if you’d like,” Tom answered with his arms crossed. 

You shrugged, telling him it doesn’t matter since you don’t really go all out on Christmas. Your family on the other hand—the house is always full of people, especially since most of your extended family are usually around during the holidays. You had this ongoing game you made for yourself whether or not you’ll be able to greet everyone with the number of people in the house. 

You could only guess how quiet your family’s Christmas is going to be. You definitely needed to call your parents later. 

“Is the sweater that itchy, Y/N?” You heard Tom ask, breaking away from your thoughts. 

“Huh?” You asked, confused. You didn’t even notice that you’ve been scratching yourself subconsciously. 

“You’ve been scratching yourself since I saw you.” Tom said, chuckling. “It’s a cute sweater on you.” 

You smirked. “That reminds me—I got something for you, Tom.” Tom raised his brow as you grabbed the bag you stashed behind the tree. “Actually my parents got this for you. A little thank you gift apparently for having the tolerance to stay with me over the holidays—as if you had a choice.” You mumbled the last part. 

Tom curiously opened the bag and there revealed a matching sweater such as yours. This year’s sweater was green and had red tinsel all over it, probably the reason why you’re itchy. The real kicker is that—

“No way,” Tom gasped “It lights up?!” He asked laughing. It lights up. 

“Yeah, I don’t recommend turning that on. I did it earlier and I’m pretty sure I was about to combust—it’s a real fire hazard.” You replied, enjoying the genuine joy that Tom is showing on his face. 

“Oh but we have to turn the lights on when we take pictures,” He commented as he put on the sweater. “Thanks, Y/N.” He said softly, surprising you with a hug. 

It’s the first real physical contact that you two had ever since that night when you made out and you were pretty adamant that people were just making up this notion of having butterflies in their stomach—they weren’t. 

Tom’s roast dinner went surprisingly well. You kept teasing him that it’s Sam that you had to thank because you knew that Tom wouldn’t last in the kitchen without his brother’s instructions. Tom pouted the whole time. You eventually had to tell him 

“It was sweet.” You told him as you helped him clear out the plates. 

Tom was confused. 

“I don’t think I’ve known someone that went through hell and back just to make a great effort Christmas dinner —even if it means getting yelled at by your brother.” You said, smiling softly at him. “I mean it’s just us two, really. We don’t even have to do this.”

“Think that’s the reason why I wanted to do it,” Tom replied. Now you’re confused. “It’s because it’s the two of us—that’s why I wanted to do it.” 

As soon as you heard those words come out of Tom’s lips, you tried your best to stay calm. To say that you weren’t overwhelmed with emotions would be a huge lie. For someone who couldn’t hold their tongue, you were speechless. Tom’s giving you a run for your money and you weren’t exactly thrilled about it. 

After dinner, you and Tom opened your stocking presents. The presents were pretty tame at the start—you both got each other socks, which was hilarious but greatly appreciated. You love socks, especially comfy and cushiony ones. You came to learn that Tom does too, which prompted you two to wear the socks immediately. 

You got him candy canes, he got you chocolates. You also snuck in those small, in-flight alcohol bottles in there too—which he ended up loving. He got you those 10-pack skincare face masks, in which you let out a huge gasp, making him laugh. 

“Oh, we have to use this at some point!” You exclaimed happily “Like, we need to have a spa night—where we just watch movies, doing face masks, eating takeouts. Oh, that’s the dream!” You sighed happily. 

“We still have two weeks left till we go back to work, I'm sure we can find the time to do that,” Tom said with a permanent smile on his face, watching you with pure joy made him feel like he accomplished something big. 

You got him one of those Instax polaroid cameras—true, it was a bit too much for a stocking stuffer especially since the box definitely stood out against the stocking, but you figured he’ll like it. 

“Darling, this is too much but I’m thankful,” Tom commented as he took out the camera from the box. “I can’t wait to use this and keep memories using it—why don’t we start right now?! Let’s take a photo of us and our matching sweaters!”  

Tom took a lot of photos of you two, in the end. A couple of overexposed photos, one with the matching sweaters, one with your faces pressed against each other, one with your faces way too close to the camera, and one where he gave you a kiss on your cheek (he asked if that’s okay, of course, you said yes. it’s not like he hasn’t kissed you before— still no conversations about that, by the way). It was a good thing you got him at least 3 boxes of those 20 pack films in his stockings as well. 

The real kicker was Tom’s “small” stocking present for you. He got you this dainty, gold necklace with a crescent moon charm. You were pretty sure it was expensive because of the teal box it came with. 

“Stop,” You gasped “Tom, now this—this is too much.” You stressed out. “I can’t have this. Nope, you have to return this.”

Tom shrugged as if it was nothing. “You deserve it. Darling, you deserve something nice after this shitty year.” 

“Tom, I’m serious. This is too much.” 

“I’m serious too, Y/N. Keep it, please. I’d be offended if you don’t.”

After the roller coaster of emotions due to the stocking presents, you gave your parents a call to wish them a merry Christmas. They insisted to do a video call because they wanted to see Tom in the family sweater—which your mom wouldn’t stop gushing about. 

“I think your mum loves me,” Tom whispered closely in your ear. He didn't have to try too hard. With the laptop propped up on top of the coffee table, you two were sitting close together on the living room floor—knees touching, maximum close skin contact. CDC would never approve. 

“Yeah, I think it’s the accent,” You mumbled jokingly. 

Tom moved his head to take a good look at you, smiling. You could feel his eyes burning your skin. Why does he have to look at you like that? Why does he have to be this close?

The initial video call with your parents turned into a whole family reunion when you found out they set up a group call with your extended family. Imagine the dread and fear in your eyes when you heard your one aunt ask, 

“Finally, Y/N, is that your boyfriend?” 

Your eyes widened as you stuttered to say your defence, making Tom chuckle. You frowned at him and nudged him saying, “Don’t laugh, tell them no or I’ll never hear the end of it.”

“No, unfortunately, I’m not,” Tom replied, laughing. “However, I do believe we make a cute couple, don’t we?” He teased, earning an earnest yes from your mom. 

You could only wish for the floor to swallow you whole. 

As the clocks rolled to twelve, it was officially Christmas. You and Tom figured you might as well start opening gifts again because Christmas Day is going to be a drag for the two of you. 

“Okay, start with this.” You said as you handed him a gift bag. You didn’t give him a lot of gifts for the actual Christmas Day because you went all out on the stuffers. 

“Pyjamas?” He asked with a grin. You made a signal for him to give you a minute. You ran to your room and changed into pyjamas. 

“Not just pyjamas, Tom, but matching pyjamas!” You exclaimed, laughing. “I saw it and figured we should do this for my day.”

“Sick!” Tom laughed. Tom got into his pair of pyjamas as well and of course, he didn’t forget to pull out his new polaroid camera to take a photo of you two. “Shit, I forgot to film our entire Christmas Eve.” He said as he saw the camera that was still sitting on the kitchen island from earlier that morning. 

You shrugged. “I’m pretty sure you’ll win either way. Just that content from the breakfast crepes was enough to secure your place.” You said jokingly.

“All I’m hearing is that you’re going to spend Christmas with me in London next year.” Tom sang teasingly. 

“Yeah, maybe bringing you to our big Christmas holidays is a bad idea.” You wondered out loud. 

“I like your family,” Tom commented with a smile “and I think they will love having me there for the holidays.” 

“That would be a nightmare.” You mumbled to yourself. 

The rest of the night dragged on. You and Tom finished the rest of your gifts—you got him a watch, he got you a vinyl player. You two managed to watch the first Harry Potter film before you called it a night. 

You were about to head into your room when you heard Tom say, “Mistletoe.”

“Hm?” You hummed, confused. He placed a finger under your chin and gently tilted your head. There you saw a mistletoe hanging by one of the light fixtures. 

“How did that even—” 

“Can I kiss you?” Tom asked, cupping the sides of your face. 

“Hm?” Tom was definitely giving you a run for your money. How can a girl with a speech turn speechless?

“Can I kiss you?” He asked more softly. All you could do was nod. For if you even dare to open your mouth, all of this would cease to exist.  

His lips gently touched yours and then soon moulded into one. It was soft, sweet—familiar. His lips were something you never thought about—at least not a lot but you craved it. You crave his lips, his touch, him. You were riding a new high and you thanked every single god that you were sober to remember this—because this, this is something you want to cherish. 

“You told me you’re tired of being alone,” Tom whispered against your lips. “You don’t have to be anymore. Not when you have me, not ever.”

PERMANENT TAGLIST: @quaksonhehe @dark-infernal-instruments @trustfundparker @emsma11​ @tomshufflepuff​ @spider-babe​ @goodgirlgonetom​

[galaxymemes]

"Fake" Texts Starter Sentences!

(Mildly NSFW...)

"Can you be a fucking man and watch Ponyo with me?"

"Stab him/her/them, I'll bail you out of jail."

"I wonder if Danny DeVito has a sex tape."

"I like you too, that's kind of why we're in a relationship."

"Can I have my virginity back?"

"My favorite film is Weapons of Ass Destruction."

"Just save my name as something inconspicuous."

"Whatever, I'm just going to get high as fuck and pretend I don't care."

"I'm trying to make a point about the beauty of loving something so much that it kills you and you're talking about cock."

"Time isn't real."

"Why do you care? I'm a grown man/woman/person."

"Go to bed, stop singing Disney songs."

"Do you think koalas get angry?"

"Hold on, I'm finishing a Pokemon battle, I'll be with you in a minute."

"I was gonna show you a photo of a drawing of Ryan Reynolds as a turkey."

"Are we gonna play with some Legos or what?"

"Ever realize that humans cut down bird's houses to make birdhouses?"

"I'm having a nice, formal conversation with my demons."

"I talk a lot, huh?"

"Hey, let's do something illegal."

"What'd you say the other night about Mothman?"

"My phone corrected yet to yetis because I talk about abominable snowmen more than the inevitable."

"I accidentally spent $730 today."

"Have a nice night, asshole."

"Teasing you is what I'm best at, sorry babe."

"Wake the fuck up, I've got memes to show you."

"I'm just gonna ignore you now."

"Why do you take like seven years to reply?"

"Only virgins and nerds spell correctly."

"What can I say? I'm a modern day Romeo/Juliet."

"Are you done being a brat?"

"You can't shrug off your insecurities by playing Zelda."

"Self care is drinking 20 cups of coffee and fist-fighting an alien."

"I promise I won't make a pact with a demon."

"I'm honestly a mess, don't listen to half the things I say."

"That's the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me."

"I swear if I see your typing bubble before I finish I'm going to have a fit."

"Stop making me think about you."

"The ocean says you're a nerd."

"The fuck is wrong with you?"

"The rumors are terrible and cruel but honey, most of them are true."

"Dude, what did you do?"

"Babe, I need motivation to not kill anyone today."

"Well, potassium is a very nice element -- very reactive, unlike that response you just gave."

"You fucking kill me, it's like being friends with a 5-year-old child who drinks."

"It's like we're finishing each other's government conspiracy theories."

"I would do anything for you darling, except eat a mushroom cause those things are fucking nasty."

"Are you done being sarcastic?"

"I feel like a chicken nugget."