#leia's ending was such an insult

[ruby-red-inky-blue]

Post hoc ergo propter hoc

A con of being friends with the White House Press Secretary, Jyn finds, is that the good-natured hazing in front of the rest of the press room goes on for far too long. Another is that Leia will absolutely not take no for an answer on the “mandatory tour”, even though she clearly doesn’t have time for it, going by the four aides that immediately besiege her as soon as they step out of the press room.

Jyn is sure there will be pros as well, but she hasn’t found any so far.

“Leia, Draven wants you in his office in half an hour about the HUD thing,” says the last of the aides, jogging to keep up with them.

“Thank you, Kate,” Leia says without stopping, her arm still firmly linked with Jyn’s. “I’m just going to finish the tour for Miss Erso here. She’s my latest charge, she took over for Hal.”

“Oh!” The aide smiles brightly and shakes her hand. “Congratulations, ma’am,” she says and disappears down a corridor.

“Four people have called me ma’am today.”

“Get used to it. This is the White House, it’s like a reflex.”  Leia stops to delegate some more important press secretary business in the next office over – Jyn gathers it’s the Communications Office – then returns to scoop her up again and drag her down another hallway.

“You haven’t shown me a thing, Leia.”

“Well, that was Kleya Marki’s office, and down there’s the mess, that’s always important –“

Jyn has a sudden realization followed by a horrible, sinking feeling. “Leia, please tell me we’re not –“

Too late. Leia has spotted her prey at the end of the corridor, and pulls her towards him, smiling brightly and heels unmistakably loud on the polished floor.

“Cassian!”

Oh God. “Leia, come on, he’s busy. It’s my first day, he can –“

“Nonsense, he just looks busy. He always looks busy.” She grabs Jyn by the sleeve and drags her further down the hall. “Cassian, meet the new Post correspondent!”

Jyn stumbles along, feeling like an absolute fool for falling for Leia’s whole spiel and letting herself be dazzled by the West Wing of it all – and for knowing the guy she was stupidly, wildly in love with in college and then left without a word now worked in this building, and still putting off preparing what the fuck she would do when she actually met him again until, well… right now.

The man who has stopped at the end of the hall is in a fairly rumpled suit, carrying a stack of files and looks achingly familiar even from afar. For half a breath, she’s standing in some Yale hallway and is about to run to catch up with him and probably do something silly like try and tackle the papers out of his hands – and then she’s back in the West Wing and they’re all ten years older and successful, serious people again. And she’s back to wondering if he still knows her name. Or if he hates her. And which would be worse.

After a beat, he turns around and walks towards them, with a spooked look on his face like he, too, briefly tripped over ten years of baggage – or, of course, like he’s trying to place someone who looks vaguely familiar. Then something, probably the lawyer in him, takes over, and he fixes an easy, warm smile on his face. She always liked his smile. He looks older, and even more tired than he used to – naturally, he’s Deputy Chief of Staff to the president – but still, he looks good. His hair looks as soft as she remembers, which is a deeply unhelpful thought.

“Jyn.”

She feels stupidly relieved. “You do remember me.”

An offended frown pulls at his eyes. She always did like those, too. They’re such a nice brown, it doesn’t translate on pictures.

“Of course I remember you.”

(To be fair, it probably is insulting to assume he’d forget a girlfriend he had for seven months, but still. He’s busy, and at least it would mean he couldn't hate her for disappearing overnight and never picking up the phone again.) Jyn opens her mouth, closes it again, feels herself blush.

“He keeps your Baba O’Reily piece on his bookshelf, you know,” Leia says with a grin, still holding on to Jyn’s jacket like she’s scared she’ll try and make a run for it. The thought has occurred to her.

“Very funny, Leia,” Cassian says curtly and makes a vague gesture down the hallway. “I… I’d love to – I have the Secretary of Labor waiting, so –“

“It’s fine, I know you’re –”

“We should catch up, though,” he says absent-mindedly, sorting through his stack of files before adding, with a quick look up at her: “Off the record.”

“Right.”

“Maybe just come by my office before you leave, if you’re free,” he says, fiddling with the files that are starting to slip. “I’ll be here, and uh, marginally less busy.”

“Okay, yeah. Sure.”

“Great. Um - congratulations, Jyn, on the – I have to go.”

“Yeah.”

Leia watches him dart off, smirking. “So, you two are really over that whole thing, huh?”

[keep reading on Ao3!]

[starsandhughes]

Penalty Box Series— Bestie’s Weekend Edition

SERIES MASTERLIST

yourusername

liked by _alexturcotte, colecaufield, and 10,566 others

yourusername weekend trip to LA with my boys? say less!

i have missed hanging out with you two losers sfm🩵 i love you both with my whole butt!

tagged _alexturcotte and colecaufield

view all 217 comments

trevorzegras a notice more than “i’m not coming home all weekend” would’ve been nice! so would an invite!

_quinnhughes at least she told you this time

trevorzegras @_quinnhughes i’m just glad she’s an hour away and not in canada again

yourusername sorry baby, it was bestie’s weekend! you know the rules! i love you, always!

trevorzegras i love you, forever❤️

colecaufield the golden trio strikes back!

yourusername i love you luke!

colecaufield i love you leia!

jackhughes i’m scared to ask who turc is because i know he’s not han solo

colecaufield @/jackhughes he’s darth vader

yourusername @/jackhughes because he’s our daddy

_alexturcotte hell yeah i am!

trevorzegras this might be the worst thing that’s ever come out of a bestie’s weekend

jackhughes i should’ve guess that

user22 i’d kill to be a fly on the wall for this weekend

user47 i firmly believe they made their own “big three” tik tok edit

_alexturcotte you’re not getting your bong back! i love you, y/n/n!

yourusername you’re a human dildo <3

trevorzegras ah yes, my favorite y/n insult

_alexturcotte @/trevorzegras my favorite is “undomesticated rat”

lhughes_06 mine is “you’re the human equivalent of the humming noise lights make”

_alexturcotte @/lhughes_06 that’s a good one

jamie.drysdale i get it’s “bestie’s weekend” but am i not a bestie?!

_quinnhughes i’m her best friend and i never get invited

yourusername @/jamie.drysdale sorry jamie baby, bestie’s weekend has been a tradition since high school!

yourusername @_quinnhughes “no brothers, no boyfriends, no girlfriends” you know the rules!! you classify as a brother!!

jamie.drysdale @/colecaufield @_alexturcotte i protest this bs

colecaufield @/jamie.drysdale aren’t you in florida?

jamie.drysdale @/colecaufield that’s not the point

user12 be honest, how high did you three get?

yourusername we didn’t have a jumping competition this year. sorry!

_quinnhughes no one ended up in the hospital this time! so proud of you three!

yourusername just for you, quintin! @_alexturcotte you owe me $10!

_alexturcotte you just had to mention senior year, didn’t you, hughes?

_quinnhughes @_alexturcotte we were all thinking it

trevorzegras thanks, quinn! now i owe jack $5

_quinnhughes @/yourusername @/jackhughes YOU TWO AREN’T SUPPOSED TO BE BETTING

jackhughes @/yourusername deny everything

yourusername @_quinnhughes what’s betting?

jackhughes @/yourusername that’s not what i meant

user4 i have a feeling these three together give quinn a bigger headache than y/n and jack together

user33 y/n, how do you feel about the stars being down 2-0?

yourusername let’s just say it was not the best part of bestie’s weekend

jackhughes can’t wait for brother’s weekend!

yourusername i can

jackhughes bitch

yourusername man whore

edwards.73 @/lhughes_06 mom and dad are fighting again!

yourusername @/edwards.73 go to your room

lhughes_06 @/edwards.73 you need to learn how to watch the chaos in silence

edwards.73 @/lhughes_06 no this is more fun

jackhughes @/yourusername we got some nosey kids

yourusername @/jackhughes they get that from you <3

[tropes-and-tales]

Bound to You: Prologue

Poe Dameron x F!Reader

WC:  2012

Other Pieces:  This is part of a larger miniseries that can be found here.

CW:  Arranged marriage trope.

Poe Dameron rose quickly through the ranks of the Resistance.  General Leia Organa trusted him, and more to the point, he always got results.  Always.

Rare intel into the First Order’s movements?  Recruiting missions to convince disgruntled members of the New Republic to join the Resistance?  Errands to build relationships with allies in the Outer Rim?  Poe did it all with his own unique panache and ineffable charm.  Being a handsome bastard with an appealing smile didn’t hurt. 

Sometimes, admittedly, his charm failed him and he found himself in…uncomfortable situations. 

Like now.

Leia had dispatched him to a planet in the Core, a technological powerhouse that built state-of-the-art spaceships.  The goal was to get a deal for new crafts.  The problem was that the Resistance had little money (read:  no money) and even fewer prospects for more.  This planet, however, seemed to prefer the benevolent neglect of the New Republic over the authoritative grip of the First Order, and they had suffered under the Empire, so there was hope that a deal could be made.

Poe’s tricky situation came from two obvious facts.  First, the planet was run by a King and his attendant family – a very rich, very powerful man.  His wealth lay in his shipbuilding facilities – the technological know-how, the expertise of his engineers, the pride in superb craftmanship that left nothing unattended.  His wealth also lay in his vast progeny:  he had three wives and, well, countless sons and daughters.

The second fact of Poe’s tricky situation was that this planet, this king, his multitude of children and wives – the entire populace, in fact – was ruled by a very stringent, very precise set of rules.  There were rules for everything:  how to shake a hand (hand-on-forearm for no more than five seconds), how to sip the strong tea they served (from a lacquered cup, but only after the host sips theirs first), how to open negotiations (after precisely one lap around the King’s pleasure gardens and after saying, three times, that General Organa sends her well-wishes and highest regards).  How long to hold eye contact, how to smile, which color shirt to wear to signal certain feelings in certain situations.

Poe would have likely always ended up messing up the negotiations.  There was no way for a single person outside of that culture to learn all of their fussy, particular little rules.  Of course, Leia had tried to send C-3PO along – the droid had tried to explain all those rules - and Poe had waved her off. 

“How hard can it be?” he had said, flashing her a cocky grin.

How hard was it?  Well, it happened like a slow-motion explosion.  First, Poe had held on a beat too long with the opening handshake.  Then he glanced away while the King’s advisor was giving him an exhaustive tour of the King’s sculpture garden.

The worst, though, was when Poe inadvertently insulted the King’s second wife.  He wasn’t even sure how it happened – there was a huge dinner, and he used the wrong fork at the wrong time, wore the wrong shirt and looked her in the eye too long, and it devolved into Poe being tersely removed to sparser quarters which, it turned out, was just a prison.

And then, there was a trial (of sorts) which just involved the King’s advisors and astrologers and high priests, who all consulted their histories and star charts and rule books.  Poe would have laughed at how ridiculous it all was, except the guards who held him carried top-of-the-line blasters along with wicked-looking scythes, so he wisely kept his laughing to himself and tried to look contrite, though he wasn’t sure where contrite looks ranked with the King.

At last, it was decided (though Poe would never quite be sure if it was due to a historical precedent or some alignment of this system’s dual stars) that Poe would be released and gifted a cruiser, along with a promise of twenty premium gunships. 

The cruiser was a wedding gift. 

For Poe.

“The laws of our people demand an allyship in blood,” declared one high priest, and Poe’s heart clenched at his implied sacrifice.  Then, the priest added, “so you shall marry one of the King’s daughters.”

So the sacrifice wasn’t implied after all.  Poe was to be sacrificed on the altar of matrimony.  His heart seized up even more, but….a cruiser and twenty gunships?  The Resistance desperately needed it, and he could always get a marriage dissolution afterwards.

The slow-motion explosion continued, and if Poe thought he’d at least get to pick his wife (the King had eleven daughters), he was sadly mistaken.  Not that it mattered:  the women of the royal court (and many of the men) were bound to the strict dress codes of their strange laws.  Long hair bound and woven into intricate designs.  Long, enameled fingernails.  Faces and hands painted in delicate filigrees of designs.  Dresses with so many layers that the person’s original shape was lost.  It made the Queen of Naboo look like a fishmonger on Quila.

The day of the wedding, Poe found himself sick to his stomach.  He’d been given his own clothes back to him, clean and pressed, and his fingers shook as he buttoned his shirt.  He raked his fingers through his curls and tried to size himself up in the mirror in his room.  He looked wan underneath his tan.  Like a man on the way to his own execution.

Him, married.  He’d had plenty of casual flings, a few girlfriends, but nothing even veered close to long-term dating or marriage.  He was too devoted to the cause of eradicating the First Order from the galaxy, and that’s what he told himself he was doing now:  securing those ships, building an alliance for more.  He gave himself a nod in the mirror, as if to reassure himself. 

All that opulence and elaborate court gesturing, and the guards led him not to a large ballroom or hall, as Poe expected.  Instead, he found himself in a small antechamber with only a few people present:  an advisor, a high priest and priestess. 

And a young woman.  Poe’s intended.

You stood placidly a bit apart from the others, and though you weren’t as elaborately done up as others Poe had seen at court, you were still hidden under layers of paint and brocaded cloth.  Your hands were folded in front of yourself and that probably meant something in your culture, but you kept your eyes carefully fixed on the floor in front of you.

“Is this it?” Poe asked, incredulous.  He couldn’t quite believe that a wedding would have less pomp than the palace’s afternoon ceremony for tea and biscuits.  He glanced over at you, and you seemed to cringe at his words.

“She is the third daughter of the third wife,” the advisor said dismissively.  “The occasion of her marriage does not warrant more than this.”

So that was the other side of the equation, Poe realized.  A cruiser and some gun-ships to offload an unwanted daughter.  He tried to look at you a closer, but you seemed to sense his gaze and shrank even more from it.

The occasion of your marriage amounted to a few muttered words by both the high priest and priestess, and then first you and then Poe signed an official looking document on thick, heavy paper.  The advisor folded it carefully, then tied it with a white ribbon, then handed it to Poe.

That was it.

No exchanged vows or promises of love.  No rings placed on fingers or hands bounds together while prayed over.  Not even any eye contact – every time Poe glanced over at you, your eyes were focused elsewhere.

And afterwards?  There was no celebration.  Not even a goodbye from your parents or any of your multitude of siblings – you and Poe were both ushered away from the palace and onto the promised cruiser.  The craft that Poe had arrived on was safely stowed on said cruiser, along with your dowry (some jewelry, some personal effects, and enough gowns to outfit the entire fleet of pilots in the Resistance).

After you were cleared to take off, Poe did just that.  He marveled at how well the ship handled, and he practically twitched in anticipation for those gun-ships.  Leia would be so happy.  If Poe returned with a wife in tow, well…that was the price to pay.  He could take care of that situation later.

He set the coordinates for D’Qar and felt the ship ease into hyperspace so smoothly he almost missed the streaks of lights that flew past.  He was only two days away from being home.  No, not just he anymore.  You and he. 

Poe stood up from his pilot’s seat and stretched.  He felt the weight of the past few days slide off of his shoulders, and he felt like he could sleep until the ship exited hyperspace.  But there was a new weight laying on him, and he left the cockpit now to go face it.

You were still sitting in the galley, exactly where he had left you to take off.  You gifted him with the barest glance before you returned your eyes to the floor. 

You were, like everyone else in your court, off-putting.  A human with no shape under the leagues of fabric encasing you.  A person with a face so painted that there was no room for expression.  And, possibly, a person who didn’t talk.

“I’m Poe,” he said slowly and loudly, and he kicked himself internally at how the bark of his voice echoed off the shiny new walls of the space craft. 

He swore he saw the corner of your painted lips twitch – a smile maybe? – but your face resumed its placid surface before you murmured quietly that yes, you knew his name.  Of course - he had signed it beside yours on the marriage contract.

“Do you have a name?” he asked, a little gentler.  “Or are you just numbered off by birth order?”

That did bring a smile to your face, and you lifted your eyes to meet his gaze for a brief second before returning to watch the space on the floor between you and him.  You told him your name in your quiet voice.  “Or you could call me number eight, if you prefer,” you added with a hint of a smile in your words.

The eighth child.  Third daughter of a third wife.  Poe had no idea what you really looked like, and more to the point, what you liked.  What you didn’t like.  What you’d think of D’Qar and its rough-and-tumble, scrappy quarters.  What you’d think of the people in the Resistance.  How much you’d stick out in your elaborate gear, how the hems of your sharply pleated skirt would be muddied within seconds of walking through the forest. 

Poe could have sat beside you and tried to get to know you.  There was some time, after all, and you likely hadn’t asked for marriage any more than he had.  But he was keen to get ahold of Leia and report his success, and he wanted to discuss his next mission, which they had already talked about beforehand – finding her brother, Luke Skywalker.  Apparently there was someone on Jakku who had a map, and that mission pushed every other thought out of his mind until Poe quite forgot about you. 

So when you landed on D’Qar, Poe sprinted ahead of you to find BB-8 and Leia, leaving you behind to fend for yourself. 

As you descended the craft, you watched the retreating back of your erstwhile husband.  Poe Dameron left you behind.  Other women of your court might throw a pretty tantrum or pout winsomely, but you were the third daughter of the third wife.  You didn’t rage or pout.  You were used to being left behind and forgotten.

So you did what you did best:  you squared your shoulders, steeled your spine, and prepared yourself for a new life in this strange world. 

As Poe Dameron’s wife.

[theangelwithawand]

So, as much as I love charming, swaggering Han Solo, the guy is kind of awkward.

At first I thought it was an issue with his characterization in ROTJ where they made him a little too buffoonish for lack of a better word, and in Solo where they leaned a little bit too hard into Han being inexperienced and naive.

Don’t get me wrong, when it matters, the man is suave and dangerous and charismatic, and I love it.

But I was rewatching ANH the other day and I realized that at least when it comes to his personal relationships (except for Chewie) Han is kind of insecure and inept at forming meaningful relationships. To be fair, it makes sense given his backstory (in both Legends and Canon) and seedy profession. But legendary scoundrel Han is not at all slick when it comes to genuine interaction.

His initial introduction in the cantina as a ruthless survivor and his cocky dealings with Jabba tend to be the bulk of what people remember about his character, and for good reason. But there’s also captivating glimpses into a Han Solo who is more human than he probably wants anyone to see.

When Ben trains Luke, Han won’t stop insulting them both, but underneath all of the posturing, he does genuinely try to offer up real advice (that a good blaster is more reliable than an antiquated weapon). Then later, before abandoning Yavin, he doesn’t want to part on bad terms with Luke so, he chokes out a parting phrase that means something to Luke, tamping down his discomfort which is visible to the point that it’s kind of funny.

The first movie largely neglects his lack of social skills in regards to Leia (they do snap at each other, but that’s more to do with their clashing personalities than anything). He winks at her at the end, but Han is good at surface level flirting.

But then we get to Empire…strap in folks.

So, their first interaction takes place in the command center on Hoth, and Han is threatened to leave. And boy oh boy does Han really want/need Leia (and Leia in particular) to say she wants/needs him.

She has her own (very understandable) issues with opening up, so the closest she can get to admitting her own feelings is saying that the Alliance needs him. Leia may see herself as an extension of the Alliance, but that’s a different conversation and not enough for Han who needs to be sure of her feelings before making his own known. (Leia seems to have the same problem. They kinda suck at communicating sometimes.)

He asks her, very subtly pleads with her to open up, to reciprocate the bit of vulnerability he’s showing. She understandably doesn’t (again she has an unfathomable amount of her own trauma), cueing a fight at and Han goes back to the Falcon to be Totally-Not-Sad. Despite the fight though, he risks his life to make sure Leia gets out during the evacuation. (Gotta love how well he knows her.)

Then we get the big kiss scene. This time, Han has decided to acknowledge Leia’s insecurities because he wants to be with her. He specifically asks her “What are you afraid of?” Yeah, he’s kind of teasing her, but he knows Leia freakin Organa is not afraid of getting her hands dirty. It’s such a lame excuse, so he calls her out on it.

Then, all of the sudden, they’re finally together and Leia is just all in (see my post about Leia’s physically affectionate nature). And…Han adjusts. By the time they arrive on Bespin, he’s the one initiating hand holding, giving forehead kisses.

It’s a way more intimate than he would afford a casual hook-up. His scrapped intro in ANH (which was incorporated into the novelization by Alexandra Bracken), literally had him forget the name of the girl on his lap.

He’s still insecure when Lando starts flirting, but above all he’s in a relationship that is so casually affectionate. It’s a part of him we’ve never seen, but it suits him well.

Then we get to the big “I love you/ I know”.

In the original script, Han was supposed to say “I love you too.” Everyone thought it was a very out of character thing for him to say. The now iconic response was created during the shooting of that scene. I agree…to a point.

Now, I love the line. It’s iconic and great and very Han Solo. Yes it’s a smooth response…but it’s also…a really weird response…

Yeah, there’s a lot of people and to be fair, he just told Chewie to take care of Leia (which is very sweet), and once again probably still has some issues expressing vulnerability.

But…he also might die, so it’s weird that he wouldn’t tell her while he still can.

The pattern continues in ROTJ. Han is a bit out of character in this one, however I do like the moment where he’s referred to as a general. It’s usually read as him proving his commitment, and I agree. But I still think it’s funny that he decided to make it a surprise. It’s so cute and weird and very Han Solo.

He’s protective when Leia goes missing after the bike chase, and when they’re reunited picks her up and spins her adorably.

He’s still not super sure how to provide comfort all of the time (there’s a few times where Leia seeks his embrace, and he seems visibly unsure of what he’s doing). During the battle he’s always reaching out to shield her, hide her when she’s injured. Then he just holds her after the battle. The way she asked him to earlier, with a small but very genuine smile.

Finally, we arrive at “The Princess and the Scoundrel” where Han Solo does the GFFA equivalent of proposing on the first date. (For real, this book is one my favorite things. It canonized so many of my head canons like a very casual proposal). It’s perfect for its balance of being both weird and romantic.

Anyway, I like Han’s soft side and I don’t see it discussed enough.

[pagesfromthevoid]

Cowboy Like Me | d.d. | 13

Din Djarin x princess!reader

Word Count: 3.1k

Warnings: Violence. Reader stabs herself. Murder.

Author’s Note: They’re gonna be happy. I swear. Just. Just be patient. Inspo for her gown! Might I recommend listening to Dress by Taylor Swift when she reveals her gown? Gif from @fictional-thoughts

Series Masterlist | Talk to Me!

The Engagement

Something about arriving in Senex, then leaving, then arriving again without issue gave Din an overwhelming feeling of paranoia. It shouldn’t have been so easy –the Crest was able to go undetected just fine, but there was no way that Calisto and her men weren’t keeping an eye on the skies. More importantly, he shouldn’t have been able to sneak back into her bedroom just as easily as he had before either, but there he was, setting Grogu up on her bed.

There was commotion downstairs –music, voices echoing through the empty halls and vents. He must have gotten there just in time for the party to have started. Which meant he didn’t have much time to get her and get her out of there. Din hoped that she had gotten the tracker out, but the thought of her cutting it out of herself brought on an anger that he needed to control if this was going to work.

Grogu babbled, reaching up to him as Din checked over his armor.

“It’s going to be okay, kid,” he promised, resting a hand on the child’s head gently. “Isowen will be here to keep you safe, and we’ll be out of here in no time.”

Din and Grogu exchanged looks as the bedroom door creaked open. Drawing his blaster, Din pointed it at the intruder, only for Isowen to stop in her tracks with her hands in the air. Her eyes were wide, but Din lowered his weapon and she shut the door with her foot. 

“The princess is downstairs with her mother,” Isowen explained, walking into the bedroom entirely, though she stopped at the end of the bed. Grogu stared up at her with wide eyes. “This must be the little one she’s spoken of.”

Din nodded, holstering his gun. “He’ll be safe with you, then?”

“I will protect him with my life,” Isowen promised, lifting Grogu into her arms. “Just as I have protected his mother.” The two exchanged looks, with Isowen meeting Din’s gaze carefully. “Treat her well, Mandalorian. Or I will be who you answer to.”

Din wanted to counter her threat and ask where she was when Calisto was pawning her child off –but he decided against it. There was only so much Isowen could have done for her, and he wasn’t going to insult the one person that his princess seemed to have left in the home that cared about her. 

She had him now too.

“The party has begun,” Isowen explained, resting Grogu on her hip. “The announcement of the engagement will not be until the end.”

“Did she get the tracker out?” 

The lady in waiting shook her head, looking away for a moment. “She asked me –I couldn’t bring myself to cut her open like that again, though. I am sorry, Mandalorian.”

He huffed through his modulator, but didn’t comment. Instead, he simply nodded and exited the room. A kink in the plan but nothing he couldn’t figure out in the moment.

*****

Downstairs, at the party, she was standing alone in the back. The hall was set up in a way that obscured her from view, but allowed for an excellent vantage point to scan the room. Usually, she and her father sat there to people watch. Now, it worked well for surveillance.

Her armor was obscured enough by the gossamer of her cape. Besides, her mother didn’t even bother to ask her about the addition. Just as Isowen promised, the sleeves of her dress were removed and allowed for a full view of the scar that took up most of her arm now. She would let the whole galaxy know what her mother did if given the chance. The Senate should know who was taking her father’s place.

“If I didn’t know any better,” a soft voice teased. From around the corner came Leia Organa with a glass in her hand. Leia gave her a small, playful smile. “I’d think you weren’t the purpose of the party.”

“What gave it away?” She asked, holding her hands behind her back now.

“Honestly, the entire thing,” Leia admitted, looking out over the party now. “Though, Credence and your mother being the actual center of attention really confirms it.”

She nodded once, scanning over the party. Her eyes caught a crack in the servant’s doorway, and a quick flash of light caught silver. A smile spread over her lips, knowing well what that meant.

Who that meant.

“Leia, I need your help,” she finally concluded, looking to the other princess at her side.

“Does it involve getting you out of this marriage? Because if it does, absolutely.”

She looked a bit surprised, unsure if Leia was being serious. But then she nodded once. “It does. But it also involves saving my…a child from Moff Gideon.”

Leia’s brow furrowed, though she kept her eyes on the party. She was certain the other princess caught her slip up, but if she did, Leia said nothing. “Gideon died, I thought?”

“Apparently not.”

“Why is he interested in a child?”

She opened her mouth to explain then stopped, realizing she wasn’t entirely sure of the answer. Din never really explained why Gideon was so interested in Grogu; just that he had been chasing after them for years now. It didn’t really matter, if she was honest with herself. Whatever Grogu had that Gideon wanted –she wouldn’t allow anything to happen to her child. 

“I…don’t know, truthfully,” she finally admitted, looking away from the crack in the door and to Leia. “I just know that I have to protect him.”

Leia glanced over at her then nodded once. “You have an escape plan?”

“I have a Mandalorian and a ship.”

“I’m sorry, you what?” 

The two finally looked at each other properly, as Leia’s husband joined them. Han Solo held a glass in his hand, looking annoyed by the entire ordeal. 

“When can we leave?” He asked, finishing off his drink. “This entire thing is a joke.”

“Han,” Leia warned, looking up at him. “This is the Princess of Senex.”

“Oh, shit, sorry.”

She waved him off, shaking her head. “It is a joke, you’re right.”

“And we’re going to help get her out of here,” Leia explained, taking his arm. “With the help of a Mandalorian, apparently.”

“Weren’t you taken by a Mandalorian?” Han asked, looking down at her with a frown. 

She shook her head, looking back out as a new stormtrooper suddenly joined the party as a guard. He nodded at her and she smiled knowingly. 

“No, I wasn’t.”

*****

Din slipped into the party with ease, having gotten rid of another trooper and taken their armor. While he wasn’t entirely sure where in the hall she would be, he would find her. He surveyed the room, searching for any sign of her presence. He could feel the weight of his mission pressing down on him, but he tried to push it aside and focus on the task at hand. 

As he weaved his way through the crowd, he kept his eyes and ears open, listening for anything that might lead him to her. Finally, he caught an offset of the room –a corner that was sheltered away. If she wasn’t in the main room, that’s exactly where she’d be. He quickened his pace and disappeared into the throngs of partygoers, slipping around the corner without a word.

A young woman stood next to his princess, whispering to her. She glanced at him, frowning deeply. “I think we should take this elsewhere.”

“It’s fine,” she promised, nodding to Din behind the enemy mask. One of his hands found the small of her back without hesitation. “He’s mine.”

The man beside the other woman gave her a wary look before he realized what she meant, then he turned to Din. “I thought Mandos couldn’t take off their helmets?”

“Doesn’t matter,” was all he said. 

He put his hands up in defense, giving a feigned look of offense. “Why do I feel like this is gonna break into a firefight?”

“Because it will,” Din offered as an explanation, and he gripped his blaster tight in his hands. “Who are these people?”

“Leia,” the woman offered, motioning to the man beside her. “This is Han.”

“And no, it won’t,” she countered, giving him a wary look. “Not if I can get this tracker out of my arm –,”

“The what out of where?” Leia demanded, grabbing her hand to pull her arm from beneath her cape. Disgust painted the older princess’s features as she examined her arm. “Stars above, this is –,”

“How are you gonna get it out?” The other man interrupted, looking over the healed scar. “Without, y’know, cutting it back out?”

“That was the plan,” she admitted, reaching for the dagger beneath her skirts. She turned to Din, looking up at him now. “I need you to do it.”

Din stared at the dagger, the feeling of anxiety overwhelming him. It wouldn’t be his first time cutting something out of someone, but something about doing it to her created a rock in his stomach. 

“I…I don’t think I can,” he admitted, voice quiet behind the trooper’s mask. 

Her brows knitted together, looking up at him with a small frown. She glanced at the other two, then pulled him to the side. “Din, I…you have to do it. I can’t; you’re the only person I trust to do it –,”

“I can’t, cyare,” he whispered back, shaking his head. “I can’t hurt you like that. I…I don’t think I can.”

“Din, if I do it, then there’s a higher chance I cut something fatal.”

“No, you won’t —,”

“Din —,”

“If you two are done,” Leia interrupted, looking between the two now. She plucked the dagger from her hands, glancing at the signet engraved on it, then back at his princess. “I’ll do it.”

“Absolutely not,” Din snapped, taking the weapon from her. Between a stranger offering to slice open his wife and that same stranger taking her weapon, Din was not having it. 

“Hey, we have trouble,” Han announced, peering around the corner. “If we’re gonna make our getaway, now is the time.”

Din pushed him out of the way, taking a breath as Calisto and Credence moved to the center of the party. Gideon was standing to the side, scanning the room for any sign of trouble. Din was about to give him trouble, but she grabbed his arm.

“Leia and Han are going to join the party,” she explained, looking at them as they nodded and made their exit. She gripped his arm hard over the armor. “It’s going to be okay, Din. Get your armor –you’re going to need it.”

He hesitated, glancing over his shoulder for a moment. There was a sudden increase of guards in the room, and Din knew well it meant Calisto was starting to catch on that she was missing from the party. Turning back to her, he scanned her features for any hesitation –any fear. But she stood tall before him.

“Do not make a single move without me in this room,” he warned, pointing at her with warning. He knew she would try to fight this on her own; he couldn’t have that. He wouldn’t have that. “We fight this together, do you understand me?”

She nodded once. “I do.”

*****

Once Din had disappeared into the shadows of her home, she made her way back into the fray of party goers. Most didn’t even notice she had disappeared from the ordeal; some asked her questions but she ignored them as she pushed her way to the front.

On the side stood Leia and Han, who were watching Moff Gideon with careful expressions. She nodded once to them as she stood at the edge of the crowd. Her mother raised a brow at her, as if suddenly realizing her daughter was even present, then motioned her forward to join them. That same forced smile spread over Calisto’s face, pretending that she was happy to see her daughter, as she stood beside her mother.

“Thank you all for coming,” Calisto announced, motioning to the crowd. “It is truly a marvelous day to be together in this room.” 

The crow clapped, cheering brightly as if they had any idea what was happening. She wanted to roll her eyes; scold them for the part they were playing in such a farce. But she played her part, standing there silently as she scanned the crowd once more.

“Today, our family becomes one with the Credence’s,” Calisto continued, motioning to Silas who stepped forward next to her. “As he has asked for my daughter’s hand in marriage.”

As if the crowd was excited to hear that their young princess was suddenly engaged to an old man, they broke out in cheers and congratulations again. From her place in the room, she could see everything. The cheering crowds, the questioning faces. Not everyone was excited; some of them saw through it all. Those were the faces she counted; the ones that she knew would be her saviors if the plan went south.

“Silas, if you would present the ring,” Calisto commanded, voice laced in an insincere sweetness that made her want to choke. 

Silas stepped towards her, holding out a rather simple ring; one that had no thought put into it. Why would he need to? She had to say yes; it didn’t matter if she liked him or the ring or anything about it. It was when he reached for her hand, though, that she glanced around the room once last time. The crowd was split; some were too drunk to realize how ridiculous this was. Some were  realizing that something was wrong.

And when Silas took her hand roughly, she wanted to yank it back. His hands were cold, as if he had been dead for years already. They weren’t welcoming, they weren’t caring. They were boney and calloused and felt like they weren’t even real.

As he moved to slip the ring onto her finger, though, she realized that she couldn’t do this. Even if it was all a facade, she couldn’t let this awful man put a ring on her finger and claim her as his. Not when she held the dagger against her skin. Her mind, briefly, thought back to the night she shared with Din when he asked her to marry him. If Credence so much as brushes against you, I want you to put this dagger into his jugular, Din had said. In the moment, it had been alarming to consider –but now, with her hand in the grasp of Silas Credence –

Her dagger found its place in the old man’s throat. 

She hadn’t even realized she had pulled it out; there was no weight shift in her hand. No thought outside of not letting the bastard put a ring on her finger, allowing him to claim what was only Din’s –the only thought she had was not to let them win.

And so she stabbed him, and every sound came back to the room as members of the crowd started to scream. Calisto was next, shouting at her to stop. Silas had fallen to the floor, clutching his throat where the blood seemingly would not stop pouring out. And there she stood, bloody dagger in hand, staring down at the body as if she hadn’t just killed a man.

Then, she slowly turned to her mother, who was now pointing a blaster at her head. Leia and Han pointed their own at Calisto as Din parted the crowds with their child in tow. Every stormtrooper in the room held their weapons at the attack, pointing at her specifically but she did not think anything of it. With her eyes trained on Calisto, she reached up, unpinning the cape and allowing it to drop to the floor. Her gown, while regal and formal still, was overlaid in an armor piece that covered her bodice to her throat and shoulders. Chainmail chased itself from the top of her chest piece to her throat and across her arms. But her arms were exposed, sheer fabric no more.

Her hands raised in the air as she turned to the crowd in front of her. Credence’s blood covered her hands, but her scar –with the tracking beckon still dully blinking through her skin –was exposed to the room. “This is what your queen has done to your princess,” she announced. Her voice shook, but she stood tall. “She has made me a prisoner in my own home. She killed your Senator for her own gain, and promised me off to someone to maintain that power.”

Gasps and cries echoed through the room as she pointed the dagger at her mother now. Calisto stepped to the side but she followed the movement, eyes narrowed. Din stepped forward next, with Han and Leia close on his heels. 

“I was not taken,” she continued, though her eyes never left Calisto’s movements. “I ran from the life my mother is trying to force me to have. And I will continue to run if that is what it takes.”

“There is nowhere in this galaxy you can go that I won’t find you,” Calisto sneered, motioning to the tracking device on her wrist, poised now to electrocute her. “I know all, child. I always have.”

She glanced at her arm, waiting for the shock but it never came. “You’re right, mother. You can find me, can’t you?” For a moment, she hesitated, then she turned the dagger on herself –prying the device out of her arm. The pain was like nothing she had experienced before; even when having it placed, it did not hurt as bad as her digging the blade of her knife into her arm and using it to force the chip onto the floor.

Blood dripped from her fingertips as she stepped on the device, destroying it with the heel of her shoe. Calisto was left standing speechless, shocked that her daughter actually ripped herself open. There were many things that Calisto of Senex did not know about her child –things that even she did not know until recently. 

“I am the princess of Senex,” she announced, pointing the dagger at her mother once more. “And I will not be held prisoner by you any longer.”

“Then you will be held as mine,” Gideon announced suddenly, aiming his blaster at her. Blaster fire overwhelmed the room, and suddenly she was on the floor, shielded by beskar and strong arms.

Din was right about the firefight after all.

———

Taglist (CLOSED): @r4iner @sgt-morgan @mingeniee @darling1darling @teriolan-blog @venusfalling @double—take @sunshine96 @lovelessprick @mxtokko @ellesvoid @waddafaknik @c-ms1ut @kokoirne @sl-ut @munsons-queen @intense-sneezing @geekrenaissance @dilf-din @tizylish @ruleroftides @aheadfullofsteverogers

[kanansdume]

I wanted to look at why it feels so frustrating for Sabine to have been utilized the way she was in the Ahsoka show and why it doesn't work even though the general concept behind it isn't inherently a bad thing.

Basically, Sabine only exists on this show, primarily, to be Ahsoka's crutch. She is the character through whom Ahsoka learns to grow. Sabine KIND-OF has her own journey as a sort-of sidestory, but her main purpose is to be there as a vessel to prompt Ahsoka's own growth.

And this is not, inherently, a bad thing to have done. Using a pre-established character in this way is fairly normal. And I'm going to compare this to the way Leia was utilized in the Kenobi show because on paper, the circumstances here are pretty similar.

Both Leia and Sabine are main characters in their own right in their original media (Leia in the OT, and Sabine in Rebels). Both Leia and Sabine did not really ever have a relationship with the main character of this new show prior to the show coming out (Obi-Wan for Leia and Ahsoka for Sabine). Both Leia and Sabine are SIDE CHARACTERS in this new show in order to support the storyline of the main character.

The difference for me is that Leia was explicitly chosen for this supporting role BECAUSE SHE'S LEIA. Leia is not mutilated and frankenstein'd into being basically unrecognizable in order to be someone who could help Obi-Wan on the journey he goes through in the Kenobi show. She is still pretty recognizable as Leia. She has the same stubbornness, the same snappy insults, the same passion and almost bossy personality. The Kenobi show and Deborah Chow have made it fairly clear that they chose the characters they did very carefully so as to provide a framework for Obi-Wan to grow through while never letting those other characters OVERSHADOW Obi-Wan just because they are also beloved characters in their own right. They very nearly didn't bring in Anakin for exactly that reason and clearly worked very hard to ensure that his presence on the show never pulls focus away from Obi-Wan entirely. Leia was also chosen specifically because they felt like it would make sense for Leia to be in this position. They chose Leia because what else could get Obi-Wan off of Tatooine in this state of mind but her? They chose Leia because who else might be able to break through Obi-Wan's depression and show him the hope for the future but her?

And while they had never had a canon relationship prior to this show, there IS just enough there to make it believable. We have a lot of obvious reasons for why Obi-Wan would care about her deeply and connect to her within a very short period of time. And we have plenty of reason for why Bail would only ever ask Obi-Wan for help in this particular situation. So the set-up for the plot and the relationship DOES EXIST within what we already know about the characters involved even if the relationship itself was new. We're also seeing that relationship develop ON SCREEN rather than being told that it existed elsewhere. The only relationships that are important here that happen off-screen are Obi-Wan and Anakin, and Obi-Wan and Bail, both of which exist within the Prequel trilogy that you can pretty safely assume most other people have seen. Everything else is developed on screen for the audience, which means nothing has to be explained at the audience through exposition.

Now let's look at Sabine. Oh Sabine. Poor darling Sabine.

Sabine was pretty clearly NOT chosen for this storyline at all. While we don't know the exact details of how this went down behind the scenes, we do know that there was AT LEAST two separate shows at one point (maybe three) that ended up getting compressed into just one: a Rebels sequel presumably involving Ahsoka and Sabine searching for Ezra, and an Ahsoka show looking at her journey of coming to terms with Anakin's betrayal. We don't know precisely how those two shows ended up combined into one; maybe the studio execs decided an animated Rebels sequel wouldn't do well and Filoni combined it with the Ahsoka show in order to preserve it in the only way he could, or maybe the studio execs came up with the combination idea on their own. We may never know. But I feel like it's pretty obvious that the original concept for the Ahsoka show likely included a Padawan storyline through which Ahsoka could come face to face with her fears and doubts about Anakin. This Padawan was probably going to be an original character who shared many of Ahsoka and Anakin's more negative traits (arrogance, brattiness, stubbornness, maybe even anger and fear from some kind of prior trauma) that would force Ahsoka to come to terms with what happened to Anakin in order to accept her Padawan.

And then the two shows got combined and Ahsoka's journey has to happen simultaneously with the search for Ezra. Except. Ahsoka's feelings about Anakin have exactly shit all to do with Ezra, or Thrawn, or the search for either of them. They could've just tossed in the original Padawan character to sort-of tag along while Sabine stayed more focused on finding Ezra, but this probably would've had the result of Sabine feeling pretty sidelined. So instead, they just... slotted Sabine into the Padawan role and nixed the original character.

Which means that Sabine lost pretty much ALL of the characteristics we knew about her from Rebels in order to fit into this new role. Instead of the merciful, compassionate, mature young adult she was by the end of Rebels, we get this overconfident bratty personality that feels more fit for a teenager than the 30 year old that Sabine actually is at this point in the timeline. Instead of being someone who connects very deeply to being a Mandalorian, suddenly she wants to be a Jedi and it's never actually explained why that is. An entire trauma was created to exist off-screen just to explain why Sabine is acting so radically out of character and even THAT isn't actually believable with how far she had come by the end of Rebels. Sabine was NOT chosen for this role because of characteristics she already had, she simply was the most convenient choice when her storyline ended up fused with Ahsoka's and as a result she is almost completely unrecognizable as a character. This isn't Sabine. It's an abomination and a piss poor shadow of the character most of us remember from Rebels.

And her relationship with Ahsoka is developed OFF screen rather than ON screen. Instead of showing us how these two ended up getting together and how they got closer to each other and learned to trust each other, etc, it just all happens years before our story starts. There's an entire history between these two characters that absolutely NOBODY is familiar with because it comes out of absolutely nowhere. And so instead of being able to WATCH these two characters come together as a team, we have to keep getting TOLD about it in either throw away lines or infodumps. Huyang keeps talking about how they work better together, Hera says they used to be good for each other, and their whole history is laid out by Baylan and Huyang separately (and the stories don't even match). There's no gradual development of trust, the two characters just careen between trusting each other and not trusting each other because of this history that is barely ever explained to us and then is apparently (almost literally) magically fixed by the end.

This is a bad way to handle this relationship even if Sabine had been a completely original character. I've seen stories where the relationship has developed off-screen and it's still, generally, worked. I mean, just for a Star Wars example most people are familiar with, let's look at Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan in TPM. Qui-Gon is entirely original here, nobody knows who he is, but Obi-Wan is a well-known character to the audience. It's set up fairly quickly that the two of them have been Master and Padawan for a while probably and then within the first several sequences we get an idea of what their relationship is like. We see the deference that Obi-Wan does have for Qui-Gon but we also see Obi-Wan capable of teasing Qui-Gon while in the middle of a life or death situation. We see how well Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon pick up on each other's queues and how they can team up towards a common goal. So while we haven't gotten to see their relationship develop from beginning to end, we get enough scenes of them together right off the top to give the audience a sense of what this relationship IS so that by the time you hit the Council scene, Qui-Gon's quick decision and Obi-Wan's shock at it are entirely understandable. But then so too is Obi-Wan's willingness to apologize afterwards and his grief at Qui-Gon's death.

So it's not impossible to set up a relationship where the history between the characters and the initial development of it happened off-screen. But the way the Ahsoka show handled it gives us really none of that. We don't get a lot of chances to SEE what this relationship actually is and what we do see often is wildly contradictory (for example we see Ahsoka not trusting Sabine and then an episode later we see Ahsoka trust Sabine with her life). The development that does exist in this relationship over the course of the show has to be done with the characters completely separated and they come back together and everything is just hunky dory somehow. So even without the aspect of Sabine being a pre-established character in her own right, the writing of this relationship makes no sense and doesn't allow anybody to actually invest in it or understand it.

But Sabine IS a pre-established character and a major character of a show of her own that has fans who already love her. So now this relationship not only needs to just be generally well-written and coherent, it SHOULD still feel like a believable relationship for the Sabine that fans remember and love. Those of us who knew Sabine remember that she and Ahsoka don't HAVE a relationship to pull from. Sabine cannot just be treated like an original character who doesn't have any history that fans already know about. This relationship with Ahsoka DOES need an explanation in order to make any sense and the easiest way to do that is to actually SHOW IT DEVELOPING rather than having it happen off-screen. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon's version of this is able to skirt most of the actual details and just imply their history while showing us their current dynamic. Ahsoka and Sabine can't get away with that because everyone watching this who has even a passing familiarity with both characters is going to be wondering what the fuck this history even is and how ti led to this particular dynamic. Which is why we ended up with a bunch of infodumps trying to explain it to us rather than something more meaningful that allows the audience to actually connect to it.

And on top of that, this was a storyline that Rebels set up to be SABINE'S STORY. Ezra's disappeared so this was supposed to be Sabine's time to shine, her moment to be the center of attention. Which means it's not satisfying to see her end up as a support for someone else instead. It's not satisfying to see her character have to be warped and mutilated in order to support someone else. This was supposed to be Sabine's story as much as it was supposed to be Ahsoka's, but Sabine ended up getting the shorter end of the stick in the merger.

[serendipity-by-chance]

because of that one post i wanna talk about things in sw fics that instantly make me click out lol. im not naming any but yeah. like okay i may not always click out cause some of them are cool so yeah

1. when they make anakin too pathetic lol. like not the funny kind but weird pathetic💀💀 anakin was a smart guy lol. like dumb in a funny way but anakin was good with strategy. he was open and honest too. when those qualities of him are taken is that even anakin?

2. when the jedi council know about anidala. like guys that’s not possible. please. the thousands of years of rules wont change cause of 1 guy. be so serious. anakin isnt that important to the jedi council. just make him leave the order😭😭 he’d be happier without being there.

3. undermining padme. need some people to read her novels to know how determined padme was to create a better world. she was a fighter till the end. her dying is more than just anakin. everything she ever believed in was shattered. some of u dont get her the way i do.

4. okay this might be funnily weird but when satine isnt mentioned!! lol. like it can have other obi wan ships but when obi was centric thing happens and he talks about love and all but doesnt mention satine? mind u thats the woman he was willing to leave the order for😭😭 stop acting like disney who like to pretend padme never existed. yall do the same with satine.

5. i love time travel fics but some of them having characters that instantly blurt out the truth instead of pausing and thinking what will happen if i do this.

6. LAST AND MOST IMPORTANT. when yall take one side with the parents. istg. leia is breha and bail’s kid and she is also anakin and padme’s. anakin and padme were created based off of luke and leia😭😭 you can’t change the similarities between them because it EXISTS FOR A REASON. but also you dont get to ignore bail and breha’s hand in raising leia. if leia was left to be raised by vader she’d be twisted into sth evil. leia’s goodness and righteousness and sense of justice, all of which she inherited from padme and anakin, was ALSO taught by bail and breha. they taught her to be a good person. someone who fights for justice and freedom. leia is all of their legacy. please stop picking sides it’s gross. anakin and padme didnt have a choice when it came to parenting leia because one was dead and the other thought leia was dead but they loved her from the moment they knew they would have a child. anakin was even convinced it would be a girl and he was so excited. to not acknowledge that is insulting really. and also, it was bail and breha who raised her and loved her. she was their child. their pride. to not acknowledge everything leia is BECAUSE of them is also insulting. i need fic writers to do better

[jessicas-pi]

📖

OOOOOH okay excuse me while I go off about a crossover inspired by one of my childhood favorite books, aka Surviving the Applewhites by Stephanie Tolan.

I call this the Surviving the Spectres AU!

So, the premise is that Kanan and Hera, along with their respective siblings, Ahsoka and Zeb, run a sort-of-homeschool for their kids. Said kids are Ezra (kanera's 17-year-old adopted son), Jacen (kanera's 4-year-old biological son), and Luke and Leia (ahsoka's 17-year-old niece and nephew, who she has custody of.) They have a mostly peaceful, serene life (they do admittedly have an evil goat named chopper who likes to attack everyone, but… besides that it's very peaceful and serene!!), until.....

Enter Sabine.

Sabine is a Bad Kid. She has lots of piercings and spiky green hair and possibly a tattoo, nobody really knows for certain, and there isn't a school left in the state who will accept her.

Except, of course, for the Spectre Academy.

They take her in as kind of a lost-cause-project. She's standoffish and unpleasant at first, but gradually warms up to them--she joins Luke's ballet class (it seemed like the least exhausting PE program of the Spectre Academy... BOY, was she wrong!), helps Ezra with his Wildlife Photography project, learns from Leia how to make bouquets that are actually insults in flower language, and unintentionally makes Jacen want green hair.

And then there's this whole sideplot with a musical--in the original book it was The Sound Of Music, but I think it would be pretty fitting if it was Aladdin in this AU. Basically, the dad in the story—Kanan in this AU—is the director of a local musical in the nearest town. He’s struggling to cast the musical; there’s one character who he just can’t figure out. In the original book, it’s a side character, but in this AU, it’s the main character. And Kanan is like, “WHO COULD POSSIBLY PLAY THE MAIN CHARACTER?! I’d cast Ezra, he looks the part, but sadly he just can’t sing…” and Ezra gives Sabine this look like don’t you DARE and Sabine is like “actually :) kanan :) when ezra and i were working on the Wildlife Photography project :) we spent a lot of time wandering around in the woods :) and we sang a lot to pass the time :) so he’s pretty good now :)” and ezra is like “i hate you”

Anyway ezra ends up playing aladdin and eventually the rest of the family pitches in and it ends with them putting on the play in their barn!

Also, Yoda is there and he cooks really spicy food.

[marvelstars]

Leia Organa & Darth Vader

I have always thought there´s so much potential there honestly.

Just looking at the few scenes of them together in a New Hope, the first thing Leia said to Vader was "Lord Vader only you would be so bold" or "Tarkin´s loyal dog Vader" while Vader was like "This isn´t one of your mercy missions Princess" and the way he says "You are part of the rebel alliance and a traitor" is full of emotion, he´s pissed she´s part of the rebel alliance but he isn´t treating her as an enemy yet, to his enemies he´s extremely cold, only says the bare minimum of words and doesn´t hold back when fighting them, with Leia he´s acting as if she´s someone he knew and feels dissapointed they joined the alliance.

It´s obvious they have seen each other before, most probably on the Senate, for Leia Vader´s isn´t that "mysterious right hand of the Emperor whose presence means death" he´s someone she can be sassy or insult to his face without inmediate consequences given her diplomatic inmunity. In fact I think the reason Alderaan´s destruction took her competely by surprise was because she didn´t expect the Empire to actually declare her and her world as enemies of the state, because that didn´t happen in her previous missons.

Now contrast this with Vader and Leia on Empire Strikes Back and they are definitely enemies and no, they are no talking about it any longer. Leia doesn´t have to say anything, she hates Vader with a passion and Vader doesn´t try to justify himself to her about Alderaan because while he was agaisn´t the order of destroying it(In fact Tarkin made the decision on his own, without consulting anyone) despite the fact Vader hated the whole idea of the Death Star, he still didn´t stop the destruction of the planet and Leia is now part of a guerrilla group looking to end the Empire, they don´t have anything to talk about anymore but curiously, she was the only one left alone on cloud city.

But once Leia learns from Luke they are twins and Vader is their father, after the shock left her, she says "Somehow I have always know" wow, why isn´t disney doing anything with this?, Leia has all the right to be furious at Vader for not noticing she was his daughter but Vader at this point had decades mourning Padme and their kid, who he thought was going to be a girl, Padme was buried with her baby bump, by doing this, Yoda, Obi-Wan and Bail effectively made Vader believe he killed his wife and his baby, I know they did this to hide them from the Emperor but Vader would see it in a different way, I don´t think Anakin thinks he ever abandoned his kids, given the chance, dark side or not, jedi or not, Anakin valued family over both Jedi and Sith, he gave up the darkside and his literal kingdom to protect them, he would have never abandoned his kids if he knew they were alive.

I think this is also the reason why Vader insisted on calling Leia "Princess" "Alderaan´s Princess" even after Alderaan´s destruction, this is his way of putting distance between them, "She´s Organa´s daughter" no matter what similarities he saw between her and Padme or between her and himself, he can´t allow himself the delusion of his daughter possibly being alive, it hurts too much more than his other hurts, what if it´s just his own mind playing tricks to him? but if this is true, this would mean people used Padme´s funeral to make him believe his child was dead and that his Master lied to him about Padme´s death and he probably can´t deal with that emotionally without going completely insane, he only manages to do that with Luke once after two decades of distance.

Going back to Leia, once she learned about Vader and her blood links, she can´t deal with that either, she manages to deny it and go on with her life but unlike Vader and Luke, she never got closure about any of this, she never got the oportunity to at least scream at him all her hurts like she did in legends, this is why on this instance I prefer Lengeds, Anakin´s Force Ghost went to Leia to ask her forgiveness for fear of her falling to the darkside and didn´t leave until she screamed at him to leave her alone and never come back, as strange as that may sound, that moment allowed legends Leia start to heal and let go of her hate without justifiying her father, she even learned about his childhood on Tatooine.

The mere fact he appeared for her, to tell her he was worried for her, wanted her to be happy let go of her hate, even if he was never forgiven, meant he recognized her as his daughter and that his loving Luke didn´t mean he loved her any less or that he would have not die for her like he did for Luke.

But in the current canon, their relationship stayed completely buried/ignored like an open wound until she was forced to deal with that because the Senate found out about it and because her Son fell to the darkside and still she didn´t manage to make anything about it, except trust what Luke said to her about him because that can help her deal with her lose of her own Son and imo it´s completely OOC for Force Ghost Anakin to stay out of one of his kids life if it would help her confront him at least once, I honestly don´t see how they justify it because it doesn´t make sense. Anakin Skywalker isn´t one to stay out of his loved ones life if he can do something to help them, this is one of the reasons why the current canon about them is so dissapointing to me, but well there´s still fanfic. :) I just have too many feelings about them.

[devondeal]

6, 12, 14, and 21 for the Star Wars Violence Ask Game!

Thank you wifey! 💙💚 I'm gonna enjoy these

6. Opinion on canon and/or fanon use of the secret child trope? Discuss

I don't mind it. The secret child can be a good trope if the context is right for it. I mean Star Wars is centered on secret child trope pretty much. Where I'm not so into it is the Korkie headcanon that he is Obi Wan and Satine's son. It's a bit too crackhead for me and also it's not my ship so I'm biased against it.

12. Name a common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing.

Anything about Rey tbh. I may not be a big sequels person but anytime the fandom tries reduce her to an overpowered female Luke and say she's unoriginal I roll my eyes.

Like they are nothing alike. Luke got to live comfortably taken care of by his aunt and uncle. He never had to scavage scraps just to be able to eat. And before anyone comes for me, I'm NOT ripping on Luke. He had what anyone should have.

What I'm saying is Rey didn't get to have guardians or a comfortable house or regularly even be able eat. She was abandoned and did what she had to to survive. As for the overpowered thing like she's able to fly ships or fight back, like come on. I repeat, she. was. a. scavanger. She got to know ship parts and as for fighting, she's had to fight dickheads like Teedo and probably worse to keep food, homes, etc. After rewatching TFA, i notice she learns from OBSERVATION. She mimics what others do around. This is a survival skill she had her whole life.

Of course Luke is going to take a little more time to learn things. He was never put in that situation where it was do or die (as any child shouldn't). Rey was and however fast she was at learning a skill is a result of basic survival instincts.

She and Luke ENTIRELY different characters and to say she's a female version of him cuz she's from a desert????? Reductive and a big lack in media literacy tbh.

14. What's the most egregious example of fridging in canon?

God which one? 😅 Fridging is probably one of Star Wars biggest crimes. Leia is the first that comes to mind because she died to redeem her piece of shit son that she did not deserve.

But then again, Anakin's turn to the dark side is also due to fridging with his mother and his wife. Especially with Padme since there's an old version where she actually gets to live a little bit longer with the Rebellion and tried to kill Anakin.

I may not be a big Satine person, but that's fridging too to give Obi Wan angst and more Maul animosity.

I'm still going to say Leia in the sequels though as the most egregious. Because it was so out of nowhere (yes I'm aware that Carrie's death was probably the reason but I don't care. There are better ways to kill off/write out a character than fridging). Her death served no purpose other than Kyle Ron no accountability. Like what in "Jesus died for our sins" is this bullshit? Why must Star Wars' most iconic woman have to go out for a man that did nothing but hurt and betray her? It's insulting tbh.

Edit: Luminara's death was fucking awful too. Like ain't no reason to have it be so horrific. Sigh... can Star Wars like not hate women for once.

21. Best canon example of a healthy relationship in Star Wars

Romantically that is a tough one. Honestly I'm coming up short with this one. Can't say Han and Leia cuz we only see their rocky start and end and nothing in between.

Maybe Kanan and Hera but their relationship kinda got ruined for me when suddenly at the end, he wasnt aware if Hera felt the same about him??? I just thought they were basically married and I'm supposed to be believe they haven't even had that conversation by THAT point in time??? Plus the ghost baby thing creeped me the fuck out. Can Star Wars please stop with the out of nowhere pregnancies please?

So yeah canon romances, nothing comes to mind. In fact Star Wars is kind of built on toxic romance.

The crackhead in me wants to say Owen and Beru 🤣

Ooo! Wait I found my answer! Cal and Merrin from the Jedi games! They are perfect 🥺 Idk what the next game will have in store for them but so far, the way they empower and comfort each other. They accept and love each other's differences. And just adorable all around. Sweet ginger boy with spicy witch lady 👌

[walkawaytall]

really long wip wednesday excerpt because i can

She leaned toward him slightly, tapping her fingertip on his arm. “Did you use part of the reward?”

Han looked at her quizzically, then scoffed, amused by something. He shook his head. “No. I—” He shook his head again. “Rieekan really does keep promises, huh?”

Leia arched a brow. “What does Carlist have to do with any of this?”

“He—I asked him not to tell ya, and it sounds like he didn’t. I returned the reward awhile back.”

She stared in disbelief. “What? When? Why?”

Han looked at her, though it seemed to pain him to do so. “Nearly two years ago, I guess. Never felt right takin’ that money for your rescue.”

“The money you demanded?” she teased.

Han didn’t laugh. “Yeah. That. Didn’t feel like I’d earned it, really, and tradin’ a being for credits…” He shook his head and looked her in the eye. “There ain’t a number high enough that wouldn’t make that transaction insulting to you, Leia.” He paused for a fraction of a second before clearing his throat. “Or any being, really. We’re not property.”

She squinted at him thoughtfully. “You were paid for the work, Han. Not for me.”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. End result’s the same. The only reason I helped get you out in the first place was because the kid said I could probably get more money for a rescue mission. Tried to convince myself that I woulda demanded money for the job regardless for months, but when you went and got yourself hypothermic our first trip here…had a lotta time to think while we were waiting to see if you’d warm up, and I kept thinkin’ how the job felt different, how I wanted you alive because I wanted you alive, not because I was afraid I wouldn’t get paid. Didn’t think about the pay at all. And every time I thought of the reward after that…It started to feel like blood money. I couldn’t keep it in good conscience. So, I talked to Rieekan about givin’ it back. Figured if there was still work to do, I could just keep saving to pay off Jabba.”

Leia thought over the time since that first scouting trip on Hoth, how that was supposed to be Han’s final mission with the Alliance, how there had been no mention of leaving since, at least not to her. She scoffed softly. “Sorry my stupidity threw a wrench in your plans to leave.”

“No, you ain’t,” Han said, his tone light and bordering on affectionate.

[shadowmaat]

Since no one's sending me prompts I guess I'll do it myself. lol

Endless- Maul, Old Guard AU

Maul is killed on Naboo and wakes up whole and alive. Most of the prequels stuff stays the same, but Maul is, for a while, convinced he's some kind of god. When he meets up with Savage he's convinced his brother is just like him, so when Savage dies and stays dead, it shatters something in him he didn't know he had. He's also captured by Palpatine and tortured/experimented upon because immortality is absolutely something that withered bastard wants.

Maul still isn't able to defeat Palps, which is another big mark against the "I'm a god" theory, but he does finally escape and goes off to lick his wounds and try to recover.

The Jedi are still wiped out, but while at first this seems like a good thing to him, there is an emptiness to existence that wasn't there before. Palpatine being in charge of the galaxy galls, and worse, he's doing a bad job of it, in Maul's opinion. It doesn't help that when Empire troopers see him they assume he's a Jedi and try to kill him. Sometimes succeeding.

One of the reasons Maul never got a chance at bettering himself is because he was too consumed with his own grievances to see past the end of his nose, but now he has an eternity to learn and eventually... he does.

Sure, part of it is still fueled by his anger at the universe, but over time he finds he likes helping others. It's strange and off-putting to encounter people who are kind to him and who don't fear him. Once upon a time he'd have been insulted, but now it's... nice. Ish.

He still backslides a lot because, well, he's Maul, but also backsliding is part of moving forward. He helps the Rebellion here and there because anyone who wants to destroy Palpatine is welcome, as far as he's concerned. If he meets the twins, he definitely favors Leia over Luke.

By the time the Sequels happen, Maul has been on the "good" end of the spectrum for a while. Maybe the lower end of it, but still good. He's absolutely not putting up with this First Order bullshit.

Lots of stuff is still the same, but I'll say Maul was fucking around on the Deth Star X-treme! so the attempt to wipe out Hosnia system partially failed. Still lots of death and destruction, but enough of the central government survives that they're forced to realize they may have made a mistake with all their waffling. Maybe.

Maul kills Snoke and is killed in return. While some underlings drag the bodies off to the incinerators, Kylo and Hux are in a standoff over who's in charge.

Maul wakes up and knocks out the troopers carrying him and Snoke, then stashes them in a room without any means of communication. See? He can learn not to kill everyone. Plus, if Fin could rebel maybe these guys will, too. Snoke burns, and Maul heads off to the reactor thingy in time to see Han talking to Kylo.

It's very important for me to note here that there is absolutely no way to excuse Kylo's choice to kill his father: with Snoke dead it is absolutely his own choice to put a saber through Han's chest. Except thanks to some timely intervention from Maul, Han is only grievously wounded instead because fuck you, Harrison Ford.

Maul taunts Kylo, saying that he's met Anakin Skywalker and can confirm that Kylo is just like him: a sniveling, spoiled brat with more hair than sense. He also says Kylo doesn't deserve the name Ben because Obi-Wan, at least, was a worthy opponent.

They fight, giving our plucky heroes time to drag Han to the safety of the ship. Kylo is all you don't understaaand, but Maul is very been there, done that, don't even have the scars to prove it.

Is there a chance Kylo could someday learn to be a better person? Maybe, but it took Maul seventy-odd years and a lot of deaths to unstubborn himself and he really isn't in the mood to take that chance.

Now. At this point it could go one of two ways: the fast solution is Maul kills Kylo and then it's just a matter of wiping out Hux and Phasma and getting Fin to help "deprogram" the troopers and dismantle the Order. OR Kylo could kill Maul and go off to have the big fight in the snow with Rey and Fin while Maul, who isn't recovering as fast as he used to, struggles to get back to the ship and trusts his apprentice(s) to handle it.

With the former the Resistance is going to realize that a First Order without Darksiders mucking things up is actually a lot more dangerous and harder to kill, though it still gets done in the end.

With the latter, the drama lasts longer and it'll be Rey who winds up killing Kylo only to get killed, herself. ...And wake up.

Either way, the trip to Luke's Sooper Seekrit Hideout includes Maul. Because I can play god with this, I'll say that Luke isn't sulking out his entire life on Ahch-To, but rather went there for Important Reasons and got stuck. He and Maul can be bickering co-Masters to Rey's training (and eventually Fin's). Maul teaches her how to create mental shields so Kylo can't intrude on her thoughts (if he's still alive).

The baddies are eventually defeated. Maul & Rey have a lot to talk about re: near-immortality. Han, Leia, Luke, and Chewie are reunited and happy to retire for good, maybe with Lando. Fin & Poe are tasked with trying to return the dozens of children saved from First Order training camps, but it's likely they're going to be raising a lot of them themselves.

Maul is finally comfortable and satisfied with the person he's become. He may not be able to change the past, but he can help shape the future. And he can try to prepare Rey for whatever may be coming next.

(Maul isn't the only immortal, just the only one relevant to this particular story)

[sonofthedunes]

angsty luke/andrie headcanons part 2 under the cut. as before these are all very depressing, and deal with some heavy subjects (tw for pregnancy loss and death)

because andrie’s force skills have been suppressed for so long, they are incredibly weak-and because they are so weak, she cannot feel luke (or really anyone else) if they aren’t on the same planet. during the events of empire when she is separated from her friends post-hoth, andrie has no idea where they are or if they’re alive for weeks. it is only upon her return to the rebel fleet that she reunites with leia and learns of han’s capture and luke’s maiming.

approximately a month after their wedding, and before they set off to investigate reports of jedi artifacts, andrie makes a request of luke which stuns him-she wants to go back to tatooine and see her family again. they’ve discussed returning before (outside of rescuing han), but it’s always facetious: luke has no ties there anymore, and andrie has quite firmly pushed hers away. after all she’s experienced, though, she feels the need to reconnect, to apologize…perhaps to explain. as she left the farm without a word, so she arrives without one, and asks luke to wait on their ship while she goes ahead. her uncles are astonished and thrilled to see her: after finding her gone four years ago they’d feared the worst, and seeing her face on imperial wanted posters did little to mitigate it. now she’s come back to them, a grown woman and a freedom fighter. they couldn’t be happier. unfortunately, there’s not much else to be happy about. andrie’s great-grandmother died not long after the battle of yavin, the farm is struggling-and zaria launches into a rage as soon as she sees her, branding her ungrateful and unfeeling. she reacts with anger to andrie informing them that she is training to become a jedi…and becomes absolutely apoplectic when andrie reveals that luke skywalker, the descendant of slaves who had so insulted the family, is both her teacher and her husband. though she brings luke into the house so that he might help her clarify, the resulting argument ends in zaria spitting at andrie’s feet and disowning her last living grandchild. and in that moment, andrie finally and forever lets go of her past. she bids her uncles farewell, pays her respects at the graves of her family, and she and luke leave tatooine for good. (as it turns out, luke wasn’t idle while he initially waited: he collected a piece of japor wood which he later used to carve a snippet for andrie, just as anakin did for padmé. she wears it for the rest of her life.)

the initial months after the defeat of the empire are happy ones: luke and andrie finally marry (as detailed in the fluffy headcanons post), celebrate the marriage of han and leia a few days later (luke officiates, andrie is leia’s bridesmaid)…and in about two months’ time leia and andrie both learn that they are pregnant. the new republic is just beginning to emerge. the future seems limitless. but just as leia starts showing, andrie wakes up one morning cramping horrifically, with her side of the bed drenched in blood. there is nothing that can be done-she loses the fetus. of course she’d known it may be possible she’d inherited her mother’s fertility struggles, but to actually experience it firsthand…luke soothes her as best he can, reassuring her that it isn’t her fault and they’ll try again when they feel ready. so the next year andrie conceives…and once more she miscarries. she begins to wonder if, perhaps, it simply isn’t the will of the force for her and luke to have children. and when she loses a third pregnancy in 7 ABY-this time the hemorrhaging so severe that it nearly kills her-her husband readily agrees that this will be the last; he will not keep forcing her to endure this cycle the way her father did to her mother. andrie undergoes an operation soon after. they know this was the right decision, but part of them always thinks wistfully of the family they never have.

we know the next part of the story: luke and andrie establish their jedi temple, take on a group of students (including ben solo), teach them together as andrie ascends to knight and then master. though they can’t have children, they come to regard their padawans as family. the balance between teachers and spouses proves difficult to maintain, but they’d known it would be and work hard at it. they are perfectly content together-and ignorant of the gathering darkness within their nephew. after the temple is destroyed and their students massacred, luke makes the decision to go into exile…alone. from the start he has no intention of taking andrie with him. she begs, pleads on her knees, to not be left alone in the face of what’s coming, but he tells her he knows she can do this. he needs her to protect leia because he can’t anymore. she is the last jedi-he can no longer claim that title, and he is wholly undeserving of her. and as he turns his back to leave, for one awful moment andrie’s anguish and terror consume her, and she draws her saber on the man she loves. of course he easily blocks the swing-he’s luke skywalker, he’s the most powerful jedi who has ever lived, and she didn’t intend to kill or even injure him-but in the glow of their blades they gaze on the other like a stranger. and that is the last time they see each other for six years.

in the ensuing span andrie is, as far as the galaxy at large knows, the only remaining jedi. just as she did during the battle of yavin so many years before, she attaches herself to leia because she has nowhere else to go; though she will occasionally fight directly with the first order, her main priority is keeping her sister-in-law safe. the two women become even closer, a decades-long friendship strengthened in the grief of losing their husbands-although andrie angrily rebuffs the suggestion that she could divorce luke in abstentia for abandonment. their vows were sworn in the living force, and words spoken that way cannot be undone. for as much as she resents him for the fate he’s shoved onto her, for as many mornings as she wakes wanting to die, she still loves him…and that love is what moves her to accompany rey to ahch-to, to at least seek his help in rey’s training and the ongoing war.

the reunion isn’t precisely a joyous one. he’s angry that his exile was disturbed at all, let alone by them; she is confounded by his refusal to train the girl and still deeply hurt by the way they parted. at long last they have it out, spilling their pain and their fear on the green slopes of temple island over the course of several days. it’s raw, it’s bitter, but it must be done. for at last luke is persuaded to aid the resistance in their darkest hour, his force projection lending them valuable time to flee crait. though he is greatly weakened by the effort, he does not die-his wife and sister add their own power to his, and a small team is ready to transport luke off the island to receive the care he needs.

even after the end of the war, and the slow arduous work of rebuilding the jedi order with their new apprentice rey, it takes luke and andrie a great deal of time to rebuild their trust and heal the anger that drove almost impassable rifts into their marriage. at times it seems impossible, but they hold to the little motto they created in the early heady days of their relationship: “you and me, down the line.” and as they teach a new generation together, slowly allow each other back into their hearts and living space, their connection is arguably the strongest it’s ever been.

and now we rip the band-aid off: andrie outlives luke, and leia, and han, and nearly every other human she fought in the rebellion with. when her husband’s death comes at 78 (his body unable to cope any longer with his chronic injuries, his mind fully at peace with joining the force) she is with him, reassuring him of her devotion until his last breath. she’d known his passing would be painful…but she hadn’t prepared herself for the magnitude of that pain. for some time afterward andrie withdraws from leadership of the jedi order, leaving it in rey’s capable hands, spending her time in deep meditation and annotating the sacred texts for future masters, occasionally visited by the ghosts of the Jedi who proceeded her (including luke after a few years)-and consumed by mourning for the man she loved for 60 years. she sinks into so deep a depression that luke himself must plead for her to let him go, to spend the time left to her shaping the minds of the padawans and providing counsel to rey. to live for him, not slowly die for him. and until her own death at 94, despite the lingering weight of his absence, that is exactly what andrie does. the girl born largely unwanted and unloved on a tatooine moisture farm dies a venerated jedi master in the temple she helped to rebuild: a beloved friend, an honored hero, a surrogate mother, and a cherished wife.

and there we have it. as always, questions and comments in my ask box are welcome!

[f1a1w1n]

No, you don't

Part five of: No, you don't

Summary: The rebels decide whether not to prosecute you or not after Poe turned you in. Later you take a trip back to Jakku with Poe. This is a enemies to friends to lovers fic/slowburn. THE NEXT CHAPTER, GUYS, PREPARE YOURSELVES. s l o w b u r n. Reader has the force. No use of (Y/N)

Word count: 2.8k

Warnings: Light swearing

Authors note: Please give me scenarios to write it really helps. Enjoyyy <3

~

It's a choir of disgruntled voices, arguing, gradually getting louder and louder as they try to talk over one another. Insults thrown, pointed fingers, brows furrowed and fists slamming on the table. It's a chorus of chaos. 

“Silence!” Leia yells. 

The room falls silent. Leia sits at the head of the table. She presses her temple with her fingers. She sits up. “Commander Dameron, please repeat the mission report.” 

Poe sits up straight and clears his throat. He rummages through a stack of papers and pulls out a sheet of pale blue paper, scrawled with tiny blue letters. He glances up at me. 

The overhanging lights cast dark shadows on his face. 

Poe clears his throat again. “We used an old empire cargo shuttle to infiltrate the empire's finaliser. The original plan was to build a crate wall and terminate the stormtroopers that were sent to investigate but-”

“-she disrupted the whole plan!” someone to Leia’s right says. He wears a captain's uniform. 

“Hey! We got Rey didn’t we?” Finn interjects. 

Darvjark Tarjoy his name plate says. Davrjark slams his hand on the table. “That wasn’t the plan, Rey was a side operation,” 

Finn rolls his eyes and leans back into his chair. 

I look at Poe. He’s already looking at me, but before I can register it he looks away. 

The captains and war strategists nod in agreement. I see Rey in the corner leaning on her staff. 

I sit at the opposite end of the table to Leia. After we got Rey, Poe dragged me to Leia. 

The cuffs on my wrists dig into my skin. I’m not a criminal, why does he think I’m a criminal? Didn’t he just call me sweetheart? I think. I almost blush at the thought. I cast the thought from my mind. 

“What are you doing commander!?” Leia yells, confusion on her face. 

I restrain myself from strangling Poe with the force. 

“She abandoned the rebellion,” Poe’s voice lowers. “She’s a Jedi.” 

“I’m not-!” I cry. 

“-Shut up.” Poe says.

“It’s not fair to incriminate her, she didn’t do anything!” the captain to my right says. “Why are we doing this? We should be grateful she still follows the Jedi ways!” 

That's a bit of a stretch I think.

I’m grateful for her. She’s one of the only voices defending me in this ‘war meeting’. She has short curly blond hair that ends at her chin, and under the overhead lights her skin slightly glimmers blue and purple. 

“Exactly, she didn’t do anything to help the rebellion! It's her duty as a Jedi” 

“I’m not a-” I begin. 

“-jedi? Yeah, explain this.” Darvjark presses a button on the table and a hologram pops up. It's a clip of me pushing the stormtroopers back with the force. 

I lower my head. 

“She’s not a fully trained Jedi,” Finn points out plainly, “and besides, it’s not her ‘duty’ to help us. What do you want her to do? Find Luke Skywalker and together they defeat a whole army of the dark side?” 

Darvjark sighs. “We need power like this, we are alone in this war. The least she could have done was tell us the force wasn’t completely unbalanced,” 

“And what? Go out of hiding, risking her life just so you guys could have a Jedi cheerleader, cheering you on?” Finn argues. 

“Yes!” Darvjark stands up. The whole table starts to argue again. 

Leia sinks further back into her chair massaging her temples. 

“Shut it!” Rey yells. The table falls quiet. She puts her hand on my shoulder. “I’m sick of this, she hasn’t eaten in ages or slept. I’m sure you don’t need her here for this.” 

I stand up. A couple of voices start to complain. Rey shoots them a look. I followed her out of the room. Just as I’m about to leave Poe stands in my way, he looks down on me, giving me a warning look. There's about three inches between us. I can feel the warmth radiating off him. I hold out my wrists, still bound by cuffs. Still maintaining eye contact I shatter the cuffs with the force. The pieces crumple around my feet. I drop my arms to the side and walk out of the room ignoring the shocked stares and disgruntled voices. 

Finn and the others who took my side leave the room as well. 

~

I sit on my bed. They added a bed to my room after we got Rey. Her bed set into the wall, creating a sunken space. 

Rey is out training while I lie wallowing in self pity. I roll off the bed onto the floor. I lay there. I can’t help my mind wander to Poe. His curly hair, dark eyes… annoying personality. 

“Ugh,” I groan. I roll over one more time so I’m laying on my back. He called me sweetheart before… I think. No stop it! He hates you, and you hate him. 

God he’s infuriating. He has such a massive ego, who does he think he is? The rebellions ‘star pilot’, what a load of crap. I know tons of pilots who are better than him. 

Not better looking. A tiny thought in my head says. “Nope no, ew.”  

I sit up and cast the thought away from my mind as fast as possible and put my shoes on. I make my way to the training rooms, where Rey is. I walk down corridors and staircases, following the ‘Training Room’ signs. Finally I walk through the doors. The Training Room in illuminated letters hangs over the door. The room is massive, the ceiling reaches up at least ten metres, and the opposite wall seems to go on forever. The floor of the room is soft grass and other alien small plants. I reach down and feel the grass, it’s silky and soft. Cement circles mark the training areas, and hologram illuminations surround the cement circles, playing different training simulations. I step onto the grass and immediately notice the ground is slightly springy. At one end of the room there's a wall of guns and targets, and the other various climbing courses. I scan the empty room for Rey. She’s on one of the cement circles, waving her staff around. 

“You finally decided to join me.” Rey puts down her staff and smiles. 

“I got too lonely,” I admit, grinning. “You’ve gotten better.” I motioned to her staff. 

She grins. “Thanks, there’s a climbing course over there, you’d like it.” 

“Yeah? I’ll try it.” My eyes scan the room. “Why isn’t anyone here?” 

“I don’t know. More for us I guess.” Rey smiles. 

I smile. In her bag I see the tip of a lightsaber poke through. “What’s this?” I bend down and grab the lightsaber. 

“A lightsaber, although I’m pretty sure you know that already,” Rey grins. “Maz gave it to me… I’m going to give it back to Luke.” 

I hand the lightsaber to her. “You should keep it, I sense that Luke has drifted from the force.” 

“I don’t believe that.” Rey states. 

“Yeah? Why not?” I quip. 

“Why would anyone drift from the force? It's beautiful,” Rey looks at me and pauses. “Why did you drift?” 

I look down at my feet. “My teacher died.” 

“Luke taught himself.” 

“Master Yoda taught him, he just learned the rest on his own.” 

“Why don’t you do that?” Rey asks. 

“I don’t think I’ll have a choice with these rebels breathing down my neck.” I smile. 

Rey laughs. “… Kylo Ren wanted to teach me, I almost said yes.” Rey confesses. 

She looks guilty. 

“I would too.” I say. 

Rey looks surprised at my response. “Really?” 

“Oh yes, the dark side is very compelling.” 

Rey looks eased at my response. “Will you teach me?” 

“Of course.” I smile. 

“It will make up for you not telling me that you are a Jedi-”

“-I’m not a-” I begin. 

“Jedi?” Rey smiles. “Go climb or something. Jedi train.” 

I laugh and walk over to the weapon rack. Lines of daggers, swords, shields, laser swords, axes and all sorts of masonry stacked upon one another. All looked unused.

I wonder if Poe trains here. 

I graze my fingers over the lines of swords. My fingers land on a metal staff. I spin the staff around, getting the feel of it, I walk over to a cement circle. 

The hologram lights up and spins around to face me. The hologram is blue written with different alien languages. “Scanning” a green light flashes over me. The words on the hologram translate. I press random buttons and hope for the best. Out of the cement circle a helmet springs up. I put it on. The helmet blocks my vision. 

“Great.” I say. I hold the sword, bracing myself.  

Three short beeps announce the training program is about to begin. I sense a large droid behind me. It fires blaster shots. I spin around and block the shots with my staff. I spin the staff and hit the droid. It recovers and fires another wave of shots. I dodge them and throw my staff into the air. I run towards the droid and slam it into the ground with the force. I reach my hand into the air and the staff falls into it. I strike my staff into the droid. 

I huff and take off my helmet. 

To my left Poe stands. He clears his throat and adjusts his stance. His face almost looks slightly impressed. I look around the training room. Rey left already, leaving me alone with him. 

“Leia needs you.” He says. The way he crosses his arms makes forearm muscles flex. 

A droid flies over and gives me a towel. I wipe my forehead with it. God I look like a mess and he looks so hot- what!? No, he does not. 

“What for?” I walk over and dump the staff back on the weapon rack. 

“Not sure,” Poe tilts his head. He scans his eyes over me. 

“Well, I’m kinda in the middle of something.” I motion to the training courses. I’m not trying to be rude to Leia, I'm trying to be rude to Poe. 

“That’s too bad,” He steps closer to me. “You don’t have a choice.” 

“Oh yeah? And what are you gonna do?” I square my shoulders. 

“Shoot you probably.” 

To my surprise I let out a laugh. “Yeah right.” 

“I will.” 

“Do it then.” 

Poe clenches his jaw. “God, you're a piece of work.” 

I catch him briefly looking me up and down. 

“Leia wants to talk to you about your mother.” Poe says. 

The remnants of the smile on my face wash away immediately. “My mother?” I say quietly. 

“Yeah.” 

I nod. “Okay.” 

~ 

Poe’s POV

I stand in the corner of the Generals office. Leia is holding her hand and quietly talking about her mother. I fiddle with the handle of my blaster while I lean against the wall. I think back to this morning. Caylie asked me out. She walked up to me and put her hand on my arm. “Let's go out, okay?”. I still haven’t given her a reply, and I don’t know why. She’s perfect, she’s pretty, smart and funny. Something's holding me back. 

“I’m sending you and Poe to Jakuu-” The General begins.

“-no I-” You interrupt. 

“-it’s non-negotiable.” Leia states. 

I’m torn from my thoughts. “What? I have raids to do. I need to fly cargo out to-” 

Leia puts up her hand. “Non-negotiable.” 

“Leia, it's fine I can go by myself,” you argue. “I don’t need him.” 

“No, I can’t lose you, you are our only hope,” Leia looks up to me and points her finger. “Non-negotiable.”  

I groan and hit the doorframe on my way out. I storm to my quarters. 

“Why do I have to go to that dry ass planet?” I grab a bag from one of my cupboards. I shove two days worth of clothes, an extra blaster, food rations, and a first aid kit. I look out my open door and see you storm past. I can’t help myself but smile a little. The way you roll your eyes like a teenage girl when you thought no one saw you. I snap myself out from this thought. “No, she’s a traitor.” 

I walk to your room. Your door is open and I can hear you angrily mumbling under your breath as you shove clothes into your bag. “Ready?” I ask. 

You jolt a little and turn. “Yeah.” you fling your bag over your shoulder. 

We walk to my x-wing. 

“You get in first.” I motion to the ladder. 

“Kay’, bossey.” You climb up and sit in the rear seat. 

I follow and dump my bag on your lap. “Hey I barely have any room as it is!” You groan. 

“You can cope.” I flick switches and press buttons. The x-wing begins to wirr. 

“Asshole” You quietly say.

“Sorry, what was that?” I ask.

“Nothing.” 

In the reflection of the front window I can see you make faces at the back of my seat. We shoot off into space. 

“What sector of Jakku?” I ask.

“North East quadrant.” 

We shoot into hyperspace. It’s quiet for a moment before I ask “What are we getting?” 

“You’ll see when we get there.” 

“Why can’t you tell me now?”

“Why can’t you wait until then?”

I tear my fingers through my hair and let out an angered laugh. “Why are you such a bitch?” 

“Excuse me?” You sit up in your seat.

“No it’s not like that- well it kinda is. You're just bitchy to me.”  

“God you sound like a child right now,” You lean back. We shoot out from hyperspace. “And you think you're not a bitch to me?”

“I- yeah well you act so entitled-” I begin.

“-Entitled? How do I act entitled? Your face is plastered on every rebel propaganda poster!” 

“I didn’t make that decision Leia did- y’know what? You’re just as bad as the sith.” I raise my voice.

“Oh really?” There is a hint of amusement in your voice.

“Yeah. You don’t do anything to help the rebel cause, for you it’s all for one and one for all!”

“Therefore I’m as bad as the sith,” I can hear the smile in your voice. You lean forward so that your mouth almost touches the side of my neck. “You’re full of shit.” You almost whisper. The hairs on my neck stand up.

 I can hear you lean back. I clear my throat and steer the ship towards the desert planet. My mind races about nothing in particular. Was that flirting? 

We touch down on the warm sand. We jumped out of the ship. 

“BB-8 stay with the ship.” I say.

We trek through the mountains of sand for what feels like an hour when we suddenly come up on a toppled down AT-AT. 

“What are we doing here?” I ask. You don’t respond.

You walk over to the foot of the AT-AT and kneel beside it. You reach out your hands and the sand beneath them begins to shift. Suddenly a silver tube launches from the sand into your grip. You stand and hold it in your palm. You toss it in the air and catch it so the tube faces up vertically. The lightsaber turns on with a low hum. 

“Is that-” I begin.

“Critical thinking skills Poe.” You twirl the lightsaber around a couple times.

“Can I hold it?” I ask. 

“No.” 

All of a sudden an alien creature jumps out of the sand and launches itself in the air at us. It knocks me into you and we go tumbling down a sand dune. We finally stop tumbling. I look down and I realise I’m on top of you, my arm above your head and the other one resting near your waist. Our noses almost touch. We’re panting slightly. When did her eyes become so pretty? Her eyelashes look so angelic. She looks angelic. Am I getting closer to her or is she getting closer to me? My nose is slightly touching yours. 

Your POV:

Poe’s arm rests above my head. His nose is touching mine. I catch him looking at my lips then at my eyes. But he isn’t making eye contact, no, he looks like he’s lost in a trance. Did he hit his head on the way down? Do I have something in my eye? I’m not sure if I moved closer or he did but our faces are closer. 

I clear my throat. Poe moves off me. “Sorry. You alright?

I look the opposite way. I can feel my face burning red. “Yep, uh are you?” I brush sand from my hair. 

Poe clears his throat. “Yep, yes, yeah I am.” He looks around, anywhere but me.“Come on, you clumsiness almost got us killed, we should get back to the ship.” 

Is his face red?

“My clumsiness? You're the one who knocked into me.” I try my best to fight off a blush. 

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[trashquisitor-shirozora]

Oh my god the Mandalorian s3 decisions being a push to make Bo Katan more marketable for women makes so much sense.

I’ve been watching the flames of season 3 for afar wondering what possibly possessed them to sideline the wildly popular duo of Din and Grogu in favor of this Bo Katan stuff, aside from the obvious future content advertisement… it’s because it’s popular with women…

Like it’s a known pattern that corporations hate when something they’ve created aimed at men is disproportionately popular with women because they strive to keep a very distinct line between Boy things and Girl things. Anything Star Wars is for men, except the acceptable Girl Things like Leia and Padme and Asoka. But then the Mandalorian became wildly popular with women and they can’t just cancel a cash cow like the Mandalorian without milking everything they can from it so they’re like “well let’s bring in Bo Katan she’s for the Women now start making the toys”

I am so late to this but that meant time to simmer and seethe over Disney's decisions before and lately, and things I've read over the years about how corporations market to their target audiences, and how little things have changed.

I saw rumors and theories that KKKennedy (y'all sorry I keep calling her that but iykyk) meddled a LOT with The Mandalorian and Jon even threatened to quit, but at the end of the day the Mouse House has the final say and we're stuck with their decisions. I really don't know how the final numbers will look, how it'll affect their merch sales, and what it means for the future seasons of The Mandalorian. Maybe the hard pivot to redeem Bo-Katan for the bajillionth time will be the new cash cow or the canary in the coal mine (for The Mandalorian; I'm sure Ahsoka will be a hit no matter what). Maybe they gambled right or they've lost too many viewers who wanted Din and Grogu to be the heart and soul and center of this particular show. It's called The Mandalorian after all. If they want to claim that it could be any Mandalorian who's The Mandalorian of these season, then maybe Season 2 should've followed a different Mandalorian and established this before scamming us with Season 3. They were already trying that with TBOBF before having Din and Grogu steal the show.

But now that I've seen those rumors and theories, I could not fucking stop thinking about what happened when the ST was rolling out and when Rogue 1 and Solo came out. I could not stop thinking about the casting choices for Rey, Jyn, and Qi'ra, could not stop thinking about how white and brunette they were. I could not stop thinking about KKKennedy and others talking about how they wanted to bring more female fans to Star Wars, acting like Star Wars was exclusively a male space, which, what a fucking insult. I could not forget pictures of her wearing "The Force is Female" shirts and pushing this message so fucking hard that it would keep showing up in critical reviews of TLJ/TROS/ST as proof that Disney didn't know what it was doing.

Rey, Jyn, and Qi'ra were lucky to not have the kind of long history that Bo-Katan already had in the gffa by the time she made her live-action debut. It didn't take much to google her involvement in TCW and Rebels, and see what she'd done. I've seen commenters say she redeemed herself in Rebels by rallying the Mandalorians but are you sure about that? Are we still having trouble with writing redemption arcs after the fucking horrible one Disney put Kylo Ren through to the detriment of every other character not named Rey?

I wouldn't have minded Bo-Katan having greater involvement in Season 3 if she didn't basically take charge of not just the COTW but also the entire show. Watch out for the new merch of her with the Darksaber now. Probably the most we'll get out of Din is whatever happens to him in the season finale because Disney gotta make more money, amirite? Grogu got a new accessory so that Disney can sell new versions of him, so why not Din?

I truly envy the poeple who are having a good time or don't need to have these thoughts constantly in their heads while watching. I didn't have a good time and I can never turn those thoughts off. I don't have the luxury so I'm never shutting up about this.

ftr I unfollowed Okiro after the billionth time he called Din, Grogu, and Bo-Katan "Clan of Three". what the fuck had she done to earn equal footing?

[nikkiruncks]

E/D divorce au, T9S compliant

There would be some tension with Eric and Donna during Leia’s school year. With people constantly insulting Eric's masculinity and Donna not doing anything about it, Donna acting like she's the best Eric could do, their personalities not meshing anymore, etc. Same thing as canon, except there would be like “sweet” moments to cover it up.

Leia would notice something’s wrong, but Eric and Donna would deny it when she brings it up. They realize that Leia is suspicious, so to not burden her, Eric and Donna pretend everything is fine and put on a show.

There would be a little bit of passive aggressiveness between E/D still, and Leia would notice. One day in the car, when E/D are being passive aggressive, Leia just snaps because she's tired of seeing her parents fighting.

E/D feels awful about putting Leia through that shit and end up going to counseling to fix their relationship, but it makes them both realize they’re incompatible as a couple and decide to get divorced.

Both end up having joint custody of Leia, and one of them decides to move out or they both move out and live in separate apartments