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imagineyourworld · 3 years

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The Wife

Wolffe x Fem!Padawan!Reader

Summary: When visiting a backwards village Plo Koon’s Padawan has to pretend to be married to Commander Wolffe in order to get the residents to back off

Warnings: Misogyny, a bit of nudity, a bit spicy making out

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-------

You had been walking for what felt like hours when your Master, Plo Koon, received a message and asked you to join him at the front of the train of walking soldiers.

“(Y/N), my dear, I have some unfortunate news”, he started.

You looked at your Master expectically. Unfortunate news could mean basically anything and you could only hope that it wasn’t anything that would massively complicate your relief mission.

“As you know we’re going to deliver supplies to the Gonchee people here, and we don’t know much about them.” You simply nodded, not wanting to interrupt your Master, who continued just a moment later. “Master Yoda just forwarded me recent information we gained about the Gonchee. It seems they see human women as nothing more than, for a lack of a better word, prices or trophies to be won or taken.”

Your curious expression morphed into one of shock and disgust. Of course you knew that not every planet had the same standards when it came to equality between the sexes, but this level of misogyny was something you hadn’t expected to be confronted with.

“If I had known earlier I would have offered to let you stay on Coruscant or accompany another battalion”, Plo tried to apologize. But you just shook your head.

“It’s quite alright, Master. If I am to be a Jedi knight soon I will have to learn to handle situations such as this one, though I cannot say I am happy.”

Plo put a heavy hand on your shoulder and gave it an affectionate squeeze. He knew you were capable of handling yourself and could fight off a couple of Gonchee if necessary, but as your Master he still felt responsible and worried for your safety and wellbeing.

“Master Yoda also said that the Gonchee usually don’t bother married women, they consider them to be claimed by their husband.”

You looked up to your Master, expecting him to continue, but he just stared straight ahead, his expression never betraying his thoughts.

“I am not married, though”, you finally said.

“No, you’re not. You’re a Jedi and shouldn’t have attachments”, he answered.

Part of you wanted to correct him. You were not a Jedi, not yet at least. But the other, bigger, part was overjoyed your Master considered you a Jedi and not just a Padawan.

“I suppose I could ask Commander Wolffe to pretend to be your husband. Just for your safety, of course”, Plo continued.

For a fraction of a second you lost your balance, but quickly managed to catch your footing again. He couldn’t know about your crush on Wolffe, could he? Sure, your Master was a great Jedi, strong in the force, and he knew you better than anyone, having raised you like his own daughter, but you have been so careful to hide your feelings for your commander.

“Only if that’s what you want, of course.”

You took a moment to consider the proposition. Feelings aside, it was a good idea. If being ‘married’ would make sure the Gonchee wouldn’t bother you and ensure you could do your job that was a good thing, the rational thing to do.

Finally you nodded. “Only if Wolffe wants to, though. Otherwise I’ll ask Sinker.”

-------

Wolffe hasn’t been watching you and the General, that would be ridiculous. And of course he hasn’t noticed how your hair shines in the sun or how you smile at your Master with love and trust in your eyes. And when Plo Koon asked to talk to him a while later he wasn’t hoping to find out more about your conversation with him, that thought never crossed his mind.

“Wolffe, I have a favour to ask you.”

Wolffe simply nodded. He would to anything for the kind Jedi who treated him and his brothers like actual people, who never showed them anything other than respect.

“Of course, General. What is it?”

“I want you to be married to (Y/N).”

It took all the self control Wolffe could gather not to look at the Jedi, not to blush and not to let his feelings show.

“Is this a test?”, he asked. Though it seemed out of character for Plo, maybe he was trying to get Wolffe to confess his feelings for you. Feelings he had spent months and months trying to deny and repress, feelings that would get him in more trouble than he could ever imagine if anyone were to find out.

“No, no”, the General reassured his Commander. He then told Wolffe about the situation and why he was asking this of him.

Wolffe nodded along with the explanation before finally daring to look at Plo.

“Did (Y/N) suggest me as her fake husband?”, he asked, trying his best to keep his voice even and steady. He knew it was a arisky question that might tell the Jedi more about his feelings than he should know, but he couldn’t help but wonder and he wouldn’t agree if you would rather be fake married to one of his brothers instead of him.

“It was my idea, though she seemed to be quite happy with you as her ‘husband’“, Plo answered in a tone that told Wolffe the Jedi had to be smiling under his mask. “I just thought you were the obvious choice, considering how close the two of you are.”

Wolffe nodded, not knowing what to say.

“That makes sense”, he finally said.

Plo looked at the young man next to him. Though Wolffe’s expression was usually stoic, now it was even more so. It seemed forced, as if he was trying his best not to let any feelings show. The General couldn’t help but realize just how similar the clone’s expression was to yours just a bit earlier.

“Maybe you should go to (Y/N) to discuss how you’re going to handle the situation. I’ll inform the others to play along”, Plo suggested after a few moments of awkward silence and with a quick “Yes, sir” Wolffe turned around to find you amidst the soldiers.

-------

By the time you were nearing the village, you and Wolffe had just finished your plan.

“Let’s go over it one last time”, he suggested.

You opted not to tell him that that would be the third ‘one last time’, partly because you knew he didn’t like being corrected and would not hesitate so snap at you, partly because going over this plan like any other mission made it easier for you to let it sink in that this was just that, a plan, a mission, pretend. You were not married to Wolffe, nor would you ever be. The two of you were friends, nothing more. Because no matter how you felt, how you’ve been feeling for quite some time now, you could never be together, even on the off chance that Wolffe reciprocated your feelings.

“The Gonchee don’t know anything about Jedi, other than that we’re here to help, so they won’t find our ‘marriage’ suspicious. We’ll them we met at the beginning of the war and have been married for a couple of months. Really, Wolffe, it’s not that complicated, I’m sure we’ll both be able to remember to play the part.”

The snark reply you had been expecting didn’t come. Instead Wolffe simply nodded and stared straight ahead.

“Just remember to keep physical contact to a minimum”, he reminded you for the fifth time.

You rolled your eyes. Sure, Wolffe had never been one for hugs and cuddling, unlike many of his brothers, who often seeked you out for a comforting hug, but he really didn’t have to tell you to keep your hands to yourself every couple of minutes, you were not some hormonal teenager.

“Will do, Commander.”

Without another word, or even so much as a nod, Wolffe speeded up his steps to join Master Plo at the front.

“What’s gotten into your husband?”

You turned around to find Sinker looking at you with an amused expression, Boost right beside him sporting a smug grin.

“Guess he’s just not too thrilled about being fake married to me”, you tried to joke, even though just the thought hurt more than you cared to admit. Of course you knew nothing could ever happen between you, but you’d be lying if you said that you hadn’t hoped that this mission would allow you to pretend for just a little while, to maybe get closer to him.

“If he really didn’t want to do it, he wouldn’t do it. I heard him talking to the General, Plo asked him, he didn’t order him. Wolffe could have stepped down and let one of us take his place. And I’m sure most of us would have happily done so”, Boost claimed, laying a hand on your shoulder and sending you a warm smile.

Maybe it would have been better to do this with someone else, someone who would put his arms around you to really sell the story and who you could laugh about the whole affair with afterwards. And yet you knew that being in a ‘relationship’ with anyone other than Wolffe would have been worse than Wolffe’s obvious dislike of the whole situation.

“It’s fine. Wolffe’s just being Wolffe, he’ll come around once we arrive at the village”, you tried to reassure both the troopers and yourself.

-------

Wolffe had, in fact, not come around by the time you reached the village. He had spent the rest of the way talking to your Master and completely ignoring you. It was moments like this that made you question why you even had feelings for him, he was so hot and cold, sending you gentle smiles and sharing inside jokes one moment and acting like you didn’t even know each other the next. But it was those few moments when his gentler side, which you alway thought was more his true self, showed, that kept you hooked.

It was Plo Koon who interrupted your thoughts by asking you to join him and Wolffe at the front to greet the Gonchee.

The small creatures were no bigger than Jawas, had greenish fur and ears that reminded you of Loth cats, other than that they looked pretty human.

“Good evening. I am General Plo Koon, these are Commander (Y/N) (Y/L/N), Commander Wolffe and the 104th. We were sent by the Republic to deliver supplies and help you reset your village.”

The Gonchee at the front, who seemed to be an older man, bowed his head slightly, the others, all male you realized, followed suit.

“Welcome, Jedi Koon. I see you have brought a female with you, I don’t suppose she’s here to stay with us?”

The way he licked his lips with his yellow tongue made you shudder. You could sense resentment practically rolling off your master at the Gonchee’s words, but more than that it was Wolffe’s arm around your shoulder that calmed you.

“My wife will most certainly not stay with you, she’ll be by my side, always.”

Maybe you imagined that his arm tightened around you as you leaned into him, but you certainly didn’t imagine the growl coming from his throat as the Gonchee looked you up and down.

“Such a shame. Having a human woman is an honor to us, you know and this one seems to be a fine specimen. You’re lucky to have her.”

Though his words sounded as if he was buying your lie and letting go of the thought of having you, whatever that meant, you couldn’t bring yourself to believe that he, or any other male Gonchee, would leave you alone. Not even Wolffe looking at you from the side, a small smile on his lips, could relief you of your anxiety.

“I feel like the luckiest man in the galaxy every minute I have her next to me.”

His words were directed at the Gonchee, but somehow they felt like more. Like something one would whisper to a lover in private.

It was only when Plo spoke up again that you could tear your eyes away from Wolffe, from his warm gaze and full lips.

“The men will bring in the supplies now, if you’ll allow, and then we’ll settle for the night.”

The Gonchee at the front nodded.

“Of course, of course. Though the lady should stay with the other women. You see, we don’t allow women to do any physical labour.

-------

Several Gonchee had offered to accompany you to the hut the women of the village spend most of their time in, but you had declined. That didn’t mean you could go alone, however. The entire 104th seemed to have noticed the glances the male Gonchee shot you and had silently agreed to never let you out of their sight while you were in the village. Which is how you found yourself with your hand in the crook of Wolffe’s elbow, being lead to the ‘women’s hut’ as it was called.

“I’ve been to many planets and have met people of many cultures, but none of them were as backwards as the Gonchee. If they could see you in action they would know not to look at you like that”, your companion grumbled.

You swallowed down the urge to tell him that quite a few shinies have made their moves on you in the past, though you had shot all of them down and had to admit that none of them reduced you to your body the way the Gonchee did.

“It’s only for a couple of days. It’ll be like a mini vacation for me, not having to do any work.”

You could feel Wolffe eying you from the side but refused to look his way.

“I wish I could stay with you”, he said, more to himself than to you. “I mean someone. I wish someone, one of us, could stay with you.”

You chuckled. It was rare to see this side of Wolffe, the side that corrected his words, that stuttered and almost seemed nervous.

“I’d like you to stay. But you have a job to do and I can defend myself, should anything happen.”

You placed a hand on his arm, and though you were sure he couldn’t feel it through the plastoid armor, he seemed to relax just a little bit.

“We both know that I can take care of myself. Besides, it’s only for a couple of hours, I’ll be with you again before you know it.”

He nodded, but the frown never left his face entirely.

“I’ll have someone come in and check on you every now and then. It’s not without reason that we have to pretend to be married, we cannot be careful enough.”

Wolffe’s tone told you that there was no use in arguing. And maybe he was right, if even your Master, who you knew would never disregard your ability to fend for yourself, thought it would be safe to always have a man, to always have Wolffe, with you, it couldn’t hurt to be safe rather than sorry.

“Sounds reasonable.”

Just as soon as the words left your mouth you stopped in front of the the small building the Gonchee had told you to go to. It looked ancient and primitive compared to the skyscrapers on Coruscant and shining starships you were used to, but through the open door you could spot pillows and blankets and a roaring fire inside. At least you’d be comfortable.

The women inside seemed to have heard you approaching, because most of them stopped their work and conversations to catch a glance at you and Wolffe.

“I guess this is it”, you said more to yourself than your fellow Commander. He nodded nonetheless.

“Be careful. Don’t do anything reckless.”

You tried your best to swallow any remark since your usual answer to something like that would be exactly what Wolffe would describe as “reckless”.

“I’ll see you soon”; you replied instead. And because you could still feel the eyes of the Gonchee women on you, you lifted yourself up on your tiptoes and pressed a gentle kiss to Wolffe’s cheek. After all, you had to make your marriage believable.

The low noise Wolffe made shocked you for a split moment. It was a mixture between a grunt and a sigh that didn’t speak of surprise as much as... disbelief? You couldn’t quite place it. Though you tried not to think about it too much as your turned away from him and entered to hut, where the women started questioning you immediately.

-------

True to his word Wolffe had sent someone of the pack to check in on you every ten minutes or so, but despite their reports that you were perfectly fine and just talking to the women of the village, Wolffe only felt a sense of relief when he saw you again himself.

You were sitting next to Sinker on one of the many logs surrounding the fireplace. The rest of the pack as well as Plo Koon were either on logs or the ground nearby while the Gonchee, mostly the men but a few women as well, sat on the other side of the fire.

As Wolffe stepped closer you lifted your head, and as always he couldn’t tell whether you had heard his footsteps or felt his force signature.

The old Gonchee who had greeted you was the first to speak up.

“Ah, the husband returns. Such a shame, I had thought I might have a chance with that lovely woman of yours after all.”

Wolffe knew that the polite thing to do would be to answer him, but one of the first things General Koon taught his men was that it was better to say nothing at all if you didn’t have anything nice to say. So he simply walked over to where you were sitting and squeezed himself into the space between you and the end of the log, which resulted in you being squished between him and Sinker. A scenario Wolffe, being the overly protective man he is, usually wasn’t too fond of, but in this the more of the Wolfpack were around you, the better.

It was only when he felt you moving impossibly closer to him, when he smelled the last clinging bit of your sweet perfume, that had somehow endured the walk to the village and your time in the women's’ hut, that he was finally able to relax. You’d be right next to him, or at least one of his brothers or the General, for the rest of the night, meaning you were safe from the Gonchee for now.

Suddenly he felt your lips right next to his ear, your breath hitting his skin.

“If we wanna sell this marriage you cannot just sit there like a droid, Wolffe.”

The way you whispered, almost purred, his name made shivers run down his spine. And though he tried to suppress it, your soft giggle told him that you’d noticed.

With a small sigh he put his arm around your waist and pulled you even closer to him. So close that he could practically feel your body melting into his, though he tried not to think about how right it felt to have you in his arms, how your body seemed to perfectly fit right next to his.

“Is this better?”, he whispered in your ear. Out of the corner of his eye he could see you biting your lip and even pressing your thighs together. He shook his head, he must have imagined that. It was probably just you trying to get comfortable in this new position.

“How long have to two of you been married?”, one of the younger Gonchee asked.

For just a moment you tensed beneath Wolffe’s arm before relaxing again.

“Just a couple of months”, you replied. Your smooth lie impressed Wolffe, being raised by Plo Koon you were usually a fan of telling the truth and he couldn’t help but wonder where you learned to lie like that.

“And you let your wife fight?”, another Gonchee asked, the disbelief clear in his voice.

Wolffe sneaked a glance at you. How could anyone look at you and not see a warrior? Sure, your appearance might not be the most threatening, but wasn’t it obvious that the way you pressed your lips together spoke of determination? That you eyes told anyone who looked into them how much you’ve been through and how deeply you cared? That your hands were calloused from holding a lightsaber and yet soft enough to comfort a clone in distress?

“It’s not up to me whether she fights or not.”

A grumble of disagreement was heard from the assembled Gonchee, or at least from the men.

“We are very fortunate to have a warrior as great as (Y/N) fighting besides us every day”, the General said after a while. For anyone who knew him it was obvious that he was trying to end the subject while defending you at the same time, but the Gonchee seemed to think of his statement as a challenge.

“But what about children? How will she carry children if she is fighting?

From the way your shoulders tensed underneath Wolffe’s arm he could tell that you were close to telling the Gonchee of once and for all, and apparently SInker on your other side could tell as well, because now he jumped into the conversation.

“They’re still newly weds, children can wait until the honeymoon phase is over, don’t you agree?”

The oldest Gonchee leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees.

“We do not care for such sentiments. Our women cook our food, sow our clothes, take care of our children and warm our beds, believe me, it’s easier that way. Perhaps you should try it, Commander.”

For what felt like the thousandth time that day Wolffe looked at you. Of course you knew that you had to represent the Republic wherever you went, but usually that didn’t stop you from speaking up for what’s right. He wasn’t sure whether he should be impressed by or concerned about your self restraint.

“It’s very different in our culture. We marry for love, most of the time at least”, you finally said. And if he hadn’t been staring at you already Wolffe would never have noticed the way your eyes flitted over to him when you said “love”.

Several of the Gonchee opened their mouth to argue, but lucky for the entire 104th a few women carrying trays with various foods and drinks appeared and rendered the men silent.

-------

Shortly after a near silent meal your Master stood up.

“I suppose it would be best for us to call it a night. We will have to be up early tomorrow if we want to reach out ship again before nightfall.”

The Gonchee leader stood up as well and slightly bowed his head before the Jedi.

“Very well. We have prepared our assembly hut for you, I will show you the way.” He stopped for a moment and looked over to where you were still sitting between Wolffe and Sinker. “Though I know you follow different customs, we Gonchee do not allow women to sleep in a room with people they’re not related or married to, which is why we have also prepared an empty hut for the Commander and his wife. And I suppose they will need privacy so she can perform her marital duties. My son will show them the way”

You were quite certain that at one point throughout the day your own rank as Commander had been mentioned, but even though you really wanted to correct the old Gonchee, you were tired of dealing with them all day and decided against it. Though the same could not be said for the Wolfpack. Several of them, including Wolffe and Sinker next to you as well as Boost next to Sinker, spoke up to correct him.

A younger Gonchee, who you assumed was said son, stood up and looked at you with a twinkle in his eyes.

“Alright, Commanders”, he said. The ironic way in which he pronounced the word made Wolffe roll his eyes, which by now you could tell even if you weren’t looking at him. “Follow me.”

The two of you bid goodnight to the others and did as the Gonchee had said. The thought of probably having to share a bed with Wolffe crossed your mind for a moment, but it was gone as soon as it came. Though as soon as the son opened the door to a small hut, smaller than any you had seen before, it returned.

The ceiling was low, the room was small and the only pieces of furniture were a small bed and a single bedside table.

“It’s not much but it’ll do for the night”, the Gonchee said. Though the words were probably supposed to be apologetic, his tone was anything but.

Wolffe, bowing his head due to the low ceiling, stepped into the hut while you remained outside. That, however, proved to be a mistake just a moment later, because the Gonchee stepped closer, closer than you would have wanted, and looked up at you.

“You might rather spend the night in my room, it’s bigger and more comfortable and I could really use someone in my bed, especially a pretty human woman such as yourself.”

Due to his words and the way he eyed you, especially with your private parts almost in his eyeline because of his short height, you wanted nothing more than to punch him. Maybe kick him. Maybe cut off something of his with your lightsaber. And if it hadn’t been for Wolffe you would have, and ruined your mission within a split second.

But there was Wolffe, knight in plastoid armour protecting you from any rash decisions. He had left the hut and was now standing behind you, from where he put his arms around your middle and, you were sure, glared daggers at the Gonchee.

“I suggest you leave my wife alone”, he growled and tightened his grip on you even more.

You weren’t sure whether it was his words, the growl or his arms around you and your back to his chest, but something about his behaviour did something to you. Something that would make it a million times harder to share a room, share a bed, with him tonight. As if your crush on the Commander wasn’t already bad enough...

“I thought in your culture you love the one you marry and if you love this woman you wouldn’t want her to miss out on spending a night with a real man, would you?”

If the situation wasn’t so tense you would have laughed. A real man? He was covered in fur!

“Wolffe gives me everything I need and more. I wouldn’t leave him for any man in the entire galaxy.”

It was only when the words left your mouth that you realized just how true they were. You really had to get that under control, having a crush on your fellow Commander was bad enough, you would not allow yourself to actually fall in love with him. You couldn’t jeopardize your friendship, your future as a Jedi knight, everything and everyone you’ve ever known for a man who you knew thought of you as a friend.

The Gonchee looked you up and down one last time before glaring at Wolffe.

“Then I suppose I should bid the two of you good night.”

And without another word he turned around and left the two of you alone.

As soon as he was gone Wolffe let go of you and put some distance between you.

“You should lie down, you must be tired after dealing with those idiots all day.”

His words made you turn around to face him. Once again you just couldn’t read him. One moment he made your heart beat faster by actually acting like your husband and the next he pretended like you were nothing more than acquaintances. But for once you grew tired of this behaviour and refused to oblige, instead you stepped closer to him again and put a hand on one of the arm he had crossed across his chest.

“I’m sure you’re just as tired, if not more. Let’s both go to bed.”

He raised one eyebrow, but other than that he didn’t make a move to break contact with you again.

“There’s only one bed.”

Now it was your turn to roll your eyes, a gesture you had often copied from Wolffe himself.

“I know that. But we’re old enough and trust each other enough to sleep in the same bed for one night”, you argued. You didn’t know what made you do it, but you couldn’t resist the urge to lean even closer, stand up on your tiptoes and whisper into his ear. “You’re my husband, after all. And husband and wife usually sleep in the same bed. And how else are you supposed to protect me from the Gonchee?”

You were too close to his ear to actually see his face, but you were sure he was smirking as he scoffed.

“I thought you were plenty capable of handling the Gonchee yourself, Commander.”

The way he said your title did something to you you’d rather not investigate any further. He was teasing, of course he was, but though two could play that game you were simply too tired.

“Just join me in bed when you’re ready. Otherwise you’ll have to sleep on the cold floor and I’ll have to explain to Master Plo why his Commander is sore all over tomorrow.” You could have left it at that, you should have, but you just had to add one more sentence. “And I can think of more pleasant ways to make you sore.”

As you left him standing and entered the hut you could hear a choked noise coming from him.

-------

“Finally decided to join me?”, you teased when Wolffe slipped underneath the cover.

Wolffe didn’t answer. He couldn’t think of an answer, couldn’t think at all. Not with you so close, laying beside him, trusting him to sleep next to you, to defend you if any of the Gonchee were to try something while you were in your most defenseless state.

“Wolffe”, you whispered after a moment of silence.

Now he had no choice but to answer.

“What is it?”, he grunted. And instantly regretted his gruff reply. This was his one chance to have you close, to forget that there was no way the two of you could ever be more than friends.

“Thank you, for today. And tonight. I’m glad you’re my ‘husband’.”

Wolffe wasn’t good with words, but in that moment he really had no idea what to say.

“It really showed us what we’re missing, didn’t it? The chance to be in love, to be married and not have to hide your feelings”, you continued.

For a second Wolffe’s heart stopped beating. Could you be talking about him not having to hide your feelings or was is just a general statement? Or did you maybe mean that you... No, that was impossible.

“Anyways, we should get some sleep now, we have an early start tomorrow”, you concluded.

From then on it only took a few seconds for your breathing to even out and just was Wolffe was about to sigh in relief that he no longer had to pretend that being near you wasn’t affecting him, you rolled over from your back onto your side and were now pressed up against Wolffe.

It wasn’t just his heart that stopped now, his breathing did as well. How could he move even to take another breath with you so close, with your head resting underneath his chin, your legs intertwined with his and your arm lazily thrown over his torso.

“Damn it”, he mumbled, though he instantly came to regret having made a sound. Luckily you were still fast asleep, if anything you cuddled up even closer to Wolffe.

Slowly, more careful than he had ever been, he lifted his own arm to wrap it around your waist and pull you even closer. He let out a content sigh, breathing in the scent of your shampoo in the process.

Wolffe knew for a fact that he wouldn’t get any sleep that night. This was his one chance to share a bed with you, and even though he would have loved to fall asleep and wake up next to you, he preferred cherishing every second of the night.

-------

The next morning you were woken up not by the sun shining directly in your face, nor Wolffe’s sort snoring or the birds chirping outside, but by the unfamiliar voices speaking in what you recognized as the language of the Gonchee.

You decided that it might be best to pretend to still be asleep, which is why you moved even closer to Wolffe and buried your head underneath his chin. In turn he pulled you closer to him, which made you realize that he had had one arm around you the entire time. You were almost too distracted by the warm and comforting presence of Wolffe next to you and the safety his arm around your waist guaranteed to notice that his breathing changed as he slowly woke up. Though like you Wolffe must have decided not to make it known that he was awake, it was only the more uneven breaths and the stiffening of his body that made it obvious.

“Might I ask why you have invaded my commanders’ privacy?”, a familiar voice cut through the Gonchees’ conversation. And though you knew that it was safe to ‘wake up’ not that Plo Koon was here, both you and Wolffe still pretended to be fast asleep. Which had nothing to do with the fact that you simply didn’t want to face a reality where you weren’t cuddling in bed with Wolffe, nothing at all.

“We... I....”, one of the Gonchee stammered.

“We were here to wake them up”, another voice, who you recognized as the leader’s son, tried to explain.

You both heard and sensed you master coming closer, and though part of you was worried what he may say, or worse think, about the position you and Wolffe were in, the bigger part was comforted by the fact that the Gonchee were either afraid enough or had enough respect for the Jedi to hurry out of the hut within seconds.

“I know you’re awake.” Your Plo’s voice sounded amused rather than mad, though to be fair, in all your years of being his Padawan you had only seen him angry a handful of times, and almost never at you.

It took a lot of self-restraint to fight the urge to cuddle closer to Wolffe for one last second before opening your eyes, but you managed. In moments like these you really wished Plo wouldn’t have to wear a mask, it would make it worlds easier to guess his feelings if you could just see his face.

“I take it the two of you slept well?”, he asked. “The Gonchee certainly seemed to think so.”

You didn’t know what to say. Was there anything you could say without letting either Wolffe or Plo Koon know just how well you slept with your fellow commander by your side? How much you never wanted to go to sleep without him in your arms again and how much you already missed him, now that he was just a few centimeters away?

“Did you understand them, sir?”, Wolffe asked. It didn’t escape your notice that he didn’t answer the question either, though that could simply be due to the fact that Wolffe despised small talk, even with the man who was like a father to him.

“I understood enough to know that they believe the two of you to be very much in love. As well as a few comments I’d rather not repeat, or think about ever again”, Plo replied. As he spoke his eyes shifted between you and Wolffe, though you tried your best not to meet his gaze. You knew that he could already tell more than enough about your emotions through your force connection, if he saw your face, saw the love and admiration that must be visible in your eyes, he would know just how much you cared for Wolffe.

“I’ll let you get ready then. Be outside in 10 minutes, we’re leaving in 20.” With those words Master Plo turned around, left the hut and left the two of you alone.

You looked over at Wolffe, who, same as you, was leaning against the wobbly headboard.

“For what it’s worth, I really did sleep well. Better than I had in a long time”, you said with a slight smile on your lips. Maybe this was overstepping a boundary, but right now you didn’t care.

All Wolffe, in a very characteristic yet disappointing, fashion did was nod before standing up and starting to put on the first pieces of his armour. Other than you, who had actually changed into a pyjama while Wolffe had still been outside the hut last night, he had slept in his blacks and didn’t really have to change, or rather undress.

You, however, did. At first you glanced around the hut, looking for some sort of privacy you knew you wouldn’t find. Then you considered your options: You could ask Wolffe to leave, or to simply turn around, while you would change and he’d do it with probably only an amused smile, or you could just change real quick while he was still busy with his armour. In the blink of an eye you decided on the second option, partly because Wolffe, as well as the other clones in the 104th, had seen you bloody and sweaty, with torn clothes and in various states of undress before, either in the medbay or when you had been in a particular hurry, but mostly you just didn’t want to send Wolffe away, not after having spent the night together.

It was only when you had already changed into your regular trousers and just put on your bra when you came to regret your decision.

“What the kriff do you think you’re doing?”, Wolffe asked, his tone mostly shocked, though there was an emotion in there you couldn’t quite decipher.

“What does it look like? I’m changing.”

You had previously had your back turned to Wolffe, but his question, or rather the way in which he asked, gave you the confidence boost needed to turn around and face him.

“Would you rather I went out in my pyjama?”

This trip really was proving to be most unusual, since Wolffe seemed to be speechless.

“Of course not”, he finally said, though his voice did sound a bit off. “But you could have asked me to leave.”

By now you really didn’t know where your confidence was coming from, but as if an autopilot you stepped closer to him, close enough to see the way his eyes, as well as his pupils, widened.

“Maybe I didn’t want you to leave.”

It was a bold statement, and maybe not entirely true, but it seemed to do the trick, since a smirk found its way to Wolffe’s lips. His eyes, previously focused on your eyes, flitted down to your chest for a moment before going back up again.

“Then what is it you wanted me to do?”, he asked. “What do you want?” A clear challenge to either back down or take a leap. A challenge you shouldn’t accept, but found yourself really wanting to.

“I want you to be here, with me. I want you to be with me wherever I go. I want you next to me in bed when I go to sleep at night and when I wake up the next morning. I want you to always look at me the way you’re doing right now. I want you to touch me and kiss me and make me yours. Maker, Wolffe, I want you!”

The words were out of your mouth without thinking. Just like that, you had voiced every thought running through your brain, made yourself vulnerable to Wolffe’s reaction, whatever it might be. Though you had never expected it to be an arm, already covered in plastoid, to wrap around your waist and a hand, warm and steady, on the back of your neck.

“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for you to say that”, he mumbled before crashing his lips against yours.

Though you didn’t have much experience, you knew that this was what a kiss was supposed to be. It was not a clashing of teeth, like your first kiss, nor hesitant and barely there, like your second, but a perfect mixture. Wolffe wasn’t rough, though there was just enough force to tell you that he could be if that’s what you wanted. His lips worked against yours as if they were made to, teeth softly grazing your bottom lip a few times before biting down. He nibbled on your lip, then caressed it with his tongue before giving the same treatment to your top lip. Some time during the kiss your hands had found their way into his hair, pulling it and pulling him closer at the same time, finally feeling the soft strands between your fingers and causing Wolffe to moan at the sensation. By the time his tongue made its way into your mouth you could have sworn that your legs were made of jelly, that you had moved on to whatever came after this life, that this was a dream.

Even when Wolffe pulled away to catch his breath you didn’t dare to open your eyes, afraid of the reality you would find if you did.

You heard Wolffe’s low chuckle before his lips were on you again. This time he gently kissed your cheeks, the corners of your lips, before making his way down. He spread small bites on your jaw and then followed his teeth with his tongue, soothing the slight sting. Though it was a spot high up on your neck, just beneath your jaw, that finally got a reaction from you. You tightened your grip on his hair as his lips ghosted over the spot and moaned when they pressed harder.

“So needy”, Wolffe chuckled.

All you did to reply was pull his head up again for another kiss, one that was faster and more heated than the last. Though as soon as you pulled away his lips found their way to the same spot again. He began to suck while at the same time pulling you back to the bed. You wondered how he had enough sense to sit down and pull you into his lap, all your thinking had abandoned you the moment his lips first met yours.

“Wolffe, I - kriff, stop -”, you panted.

As soon as you said the word he pulled away, though his hands still had a grip on you, it loosened and he looked at you with nothing but love and lust in his eyes.

“What is it, mesh’la?”

For a moment you leaned your forehead against his shoulder before straightening up again and looking at him.

“As much as I’d love for you to leave hickeys all over, we both know that you can’t. No one can know this ever happened”, you told him, making sure to put just enough authority in your voice to make him take you seriously.

A sly grin was on his lips as soon as the words left your mouth.

“I know, cyare”, he reassured you. He leaned closer again, though this time his lips didn’t move to your neck, but to your ear. “But later I’ll mark you in places where no one but me will see.”

The thought alone send shivers down your spine and heat to your core, but it also placed a smile on your face.

“Looking forward to it”, you said and placed a quick peck on his lips. Though you should have known that Wolffe wouldn’t leave it at that. He pulled you closer once again, the hand on your waist now moving upwards and to the front until it cupped your breast. Gently, in stark contrast to the way he bit down on your lip, he squeezed and massaged in before moving on to the other one.

Another moan escaped your lips, this one even louder.

“Careful, we don’t want anyone to hear you, do we?”

You were about to nod in agreement when an idea popped into your head.

“I bet hearing me would make the Gonchee really believe that we’re married.”

Wolffe chuckled as he once again moved his hands to your waist.

“I think they already believe us, cyare.”

-------

It had taken the two of you a while to finally separate and make yourselves look presentable, and only when you heard Sinker calling for the last men to hurry up did you finally leave the hut.

Now, on your way back to the ship, the two of you were finally together again after you had talked to Plo Koon and Wolffe to the other clones for a while.

“You know, I’m really glad it was you I was fake married to”, you confessed in a whisper.

Wolffe’s hand brushed against yours for a second while he chuckled.

“You know, maybe one day we can scratch the ‘fake’.”

He saw the surprise in your eyes as you looked up to him. Truth be told, he hadn’t meant to say that in that moment, but he knew he wanted it to be true. Some day, when the war was over, if you would still want him by your side by then.

“I’d like that. I’d like that very much”, you said with a smile. “But first, I think there’s something else we need to do, once we have some time and privacy.”

Wolffe knew exactly what you were talking about, and though he couldn’t wait to feel you, to hear you and touch you again, he also couldn’t wait for the day he would get to call you his wife for real. Maybe, after such a long time of denying his feelings and then refusing to act on them, this trip to the Gonchee village and pretending to be married had been good for something after all.

I tried to put a little bit of everything (and by ‘everything’ I mean some of my favourite tropes) into this story, I hope you enjoyed it.

As always, feedback is greatly appreciated. <3

#wolffe x reader #commander wolffe x reader #wolffe x you #commander wolffe x you #wolffe x y/n #commander wolffe x y/n #commander wolffe imagine #wolffe imagine

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smhalltheurlsaretaken · 4 years

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Sorry but what exactly is up with the bad batch arc? I've heard people talk about the issues with echo's white skin but I haven't heard that many bad things about the arc itself? (ik you said you don't want to be negative on your blog so I would absolutely understand if you didn't answer this ask)

Oooooooooooh boy. Well I just had a long, long, LONG rant about it with someone, but I guess I’ve got an excuse to put all of my points onto a post and talk about it publicly now that I got an ask x) I’ll keep it under the cut so I don’t throw my salt in people’s face. I really don’t want to upset people who love that arc - it has redeeming qualities, but overall it pisses me off so much for so many reasons. So here:

The first issue is obviously two members of the Bad Batch (minus Echo) being being just about the furthest thing from maori no matter how much you're willing to stretch it.

Like... yeah, nah. I wouldn’t even accept Crosshair and Tech (grey haired guy and goggles guy) as Jango’s natural biological sons, nevermind as his clones.

The problem is that their different appearances are justified by them being described simply as clones with desirable mutations (i.e superpowers). But why the hell did the creators have to change their appearances for that to be a thing? How does that correlate? Sure, the concept of clones with different faces is interesting, except... no, no it’s not, and I’m gonna rant about it in a few secs. But basically it's like they thought giving them different faces would be a good substitute for having different personalities (another thing I’ll come back to). If they really wanted to have buff clones with super eyesight or whatnot they could have just done that, without making them lose what little melanin the lighting of the show had allowed the other Clones to keep.

But the gigantic problem is... showing that the "regular" clones have VERY distinct identities despite their identical faces has been one of the themes of the show from episode 1. Literally, the first episode of TCW has Yoda taking time out of a mission with galactic stakes to tell the three clones he’s with (who tell him they’re all the same because they have the same faces) that they’re wrong, and that they’re very different in the Force, that their appearance doesn’t matter, that they’re all equally unique and important, and he lists all of their individual skills, strengths and weaknesses.

And it’s not just me being bothered by that, here’s a post by @cacodaemonia saying the same thing.

Introducing the Bad Batch as "unique" clones who are "different" and "not like their brothers" because they have different faces and skills completely breaks that theme of the show!! Because the entire point of the Clones in TCW is that their faces don't matter, they ARE unique!

(Plus the Bad Batch’s character designs are so cliche and uninspired it’s just laughable to try and justify bleaching their freaking skin for the sake of visual diversity.

This took like 10 seconds. I found the first guy by literally googling “soldier movies,” and the other two are Team Fortress characters that look a LOT like Wrecker and Crosshair. One is “Heavy” and one is “Sniper” lmao.

And behold:

The above picture is a Team Fortress reference that I found just by looking up “bad batch clone wars,” so I’m not the only person who sees it.)

And the batchers don't even have personalities to justify calling them unique! They have no character traits beyond the most cliché american soldier tropes ever. We have a token loner sniper, a token "smart tech guy" who knows everything from xenoanthropology to biology to Separatist computers to sound waves to encryption, a token Badass Brooding Leader and a token “dumb muscle guy.”

I dare anyone to find more about their personalities than this: - Crosshair is the perpetually grumpy sniper who looks down on "regs,” - Wrecker likes to blow up stuff and doesn't like heights, - Hunter is the leader and is friends with Cody, - Tech is smart doesn't trust Echo.

That’s it, that’s literally it. Four episodes about them and that's all we get. These character tropes are literally the least inventive ever. FFS, Hunter even has a freaking KNIFE! Not a vibroblade, mind you, like in kriffing Star Wars. A knife. Against metal droids. Why. They couldn’t make this more of an american-war-movies cliché fest if they tried. (And sure, he can feel electromagnetic waves so maybe it does make sense for him not to carry a vibroblade and maybe this is nitpicking, but he looks like a ripoff of a Predator character and it pisses me off).

Another thing is that when you introduce characters you have to make them likable - and them despising the normal Clones is a terrible way to do that! And they don't even grow from that because at the end of the 4 episodes arc they just see Rex as not bad "for a reg" and they see Echo as no longer a reg, and both of these things are infuriating!

The worst thing imo is that Echo then becomes part of them (and irreparably loses his melanin in the process, uuuuuuuuugh) when there is nothing to justify this.

The dialogue goes like this:

ECHO: You coming? TECH: Not really our thing. CROSSHAIR: Accolades. WRECKER: Yeah, we're just in it for the thrill. Yo! HUNTER: You sure it's your thing? ECHO: What do you mean? HUNTER: Your path is different. Like ours. If you ever feel like you don't fit in with them, well, find us. (they leave) REX: Those are some of the finest troopers I've ever fought alongside. Echo. You and I go way back. If that's where you feel your place is, then that's where you belong.

Echo doesn't feel like he belongs anymore, okay, but why would he feel like he belongs with the assholes who up to the last five minutes of the mission thought he was probably a traitor, and also verbally expressed that he was not worth saving?? In all of the arc, Echo himself never voices that he feels he’s not ‘like the other Clones’ anymore and that he feels it’s a problem. His relationship with Rex immediately picks up where they left things off - the first thing he does upon being lucid again for the first in over a year is cracking a joke for Rex’s benefit.

Why would Echo feel like he doesn’t belong in the 501st anymore, when we don't even see him interacting with anyone from his past life except for Rex and Anakin (who are both extremely very supportive of him)?? If there had been one scene of a “regular” Clone (ugh) looking at him with horror and disgust or something, or just Kix and Jesse cracking jokes with Echo awkwardly standing by the side not getting it, I could forgive the show trying to make it feel like he has an identity crisis, but this was so shallow!

The only thing that makes Echo and the Bad Batch’s experiences similar is that they *look* different. It’s so against the themes of the Clones I’m seething just from thinking about it. And what the hell? Echo ALREADY didn’t fit in. That was the WHOLE POINT of Domino Squad. They didn’t fit in because they thought they were better than anyone else because they had trouble getting along with their brothers, so obviously it had to be their brothers’ fault (ahem, Bad Batch?). And you know what happened? Domino Squad OVERCAME that. And Echo and Fives still didn’t “fit in” because their personalities were unique and creative, and they became ARC Troopers because Cody, Rex and the Jedi VALUED THEM FOR PRECISELY THAT. Echo having new and unique skills and a modified appearance is the most bs justification for him feeling like he doesn’t belong!!

And that brings me to my biggest issue: Rex telling Echo the bad batch are some of the best troopers he's ever met. I'm sorry, based on WHAT? What Rex values above everything is loyalty and brotherhood, and the Bad Batch DOESN'T DISPLAY ANY OF THAT. We never see them even expressing concern for each other! Wrecker treats saving Cody’s life like a trivial issue, because it’s just ‘sO eAsY’ for him, and beyond that we never see them supporting each other or genuinely expressing affection for each other beyond boasting about each other’s skills...

Sure they can destroy a lot of droids, but they're dismissive of Rex's brothers, and the entire Umbara arc and this arc showed what he thought of that. They keep saying things like "not bad for a reg,” don't show any trust in Rex's skills or experience (even though they can't have been fighting in the war for more than a year and a half when he’s been there from the beginning, and he outranks all of them), they are essentially guerilla fighters which has only minimal value in a galactic war, and they never grow beyond their views of what regs are, and can and can’t do.

None of that should make them good troopers in Rex's book. Going back to Echo not fitting in, remember who taught the Domino Squad the importance of seeing all of your brothers as important and equally valuable? Shaak Ti, true, but more importantly? 99! The guy the Bad Batch are named after. He did have value and was important and was no less of a trooper than his brothers, even though his mutations made him LESS powerful, not more. (And btw, just from a writing standpoint, the batchers don’t have any weaknesses, which is shit.) Cody and Rex mourned 99 as a true soldier even though it wasn’t his sacrifice that brought them victory (which would have implied that he had value as a soldier and a brother because he saved them, as opposed to him having that value intrinsically), because that’s what a fine trooper is to them. A BROTHER first a foremost, someone altruistic, brave and loyal. The Bad Batch distort the meaning of 99's character with their behavior. They’re not altruistic, their bravery is mitigated by the fact that they’re freaking invincible, so of course they take risks (again, see Wrecker saving Cody without a care because it’s easy to him, as opposed to Rex being ready to run into a burning ship about to explode because his brother is in there, and having to be physically dragged away). The Bad Batch denigrate their brothers for being less skilled, thinking their own abilities make them unique somehow, when 99 could barely fight and was still the one who taught Hevy about being a good soldier.

And again the batchers don't grow from that. Which is all the more frustrating because the original ending didn’t have Echo joining them, from what I remember of the unfinished episodes, and the arc actually ended with them receiving their medals in front of regular troopers who cheer for them, as opposed to them smugly ostracizing themselves and dismissing the ceremony as trivial and meaningless. (original ending vs s7 ending: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ab1eCfzKamw)

It’s so annoying. Do you know what characters never had an entire arc dedicated to them and still have far more personality and more interesting designs and more symbolic weight??

Jesse, for starters. Kix. Dogma. Cut. Slick. Keeli. Ponds. Rys, Jek and Thire. Commander Doom. Commander Fox. Wolffe. Hevy. Hardcase.

Cody was a more interesting character just in his RotS appearances.

Waxer and Boil had one episode about them and then only two cameos plus Waxer’s death, and they’re still some of the most memorable, beloved Clones of the whole show. And Boil was grouchy and prejudiced like Crosshair, but he has so much growth that we could make a whole thread about it.

I'd say the last problem with the Bad Batch is that it has cash grabbing money hungry vibes. Different faces are more marketable, cliché personalities are more toy-friendly, and it's basically a big ad for the Bad Batch series. And they throw Echo in the Batch at the end for bs reasons (again, it wasn’t in the original ep from what I remember) and they tease Cody in the show to make sure fans will still watch even if they notice the lack of soul. And less melanin sells more at Disney apparently.

So that’s my whole pissed rant.

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nevertheless-moving · 4 years

Text

Unnamed Extremely Bad Plan to Defeat Darth Sideous AU - SW AU NO 9

Hopefully writing down this star wars au will help me exorcise the cringe demon that helped midwife it. Time travel au where obi-wan and Anakin come up with an extremely SPECIFIC and UNCOMFORTABLE plan to defeat Palpatine because it unfortunately, would actually work, as it capitalizes on one of Palpatine’s easiest to reach political vulnerabilities. This is not a unique plan- there are other au’s like this, but this one is mine. When searching for ways to explain exactly why this anti-sith strategy inspires such cringe and delight in myself I realized, with sinking dread, I have seen this in an Always Sunny episode...which yeah. I might be over reacting but hey, cringe is a personal phenomenon, everyone’s different.

Anyway! Uh here’s a bunch of plot that will eventually culminate in the plan.

*Too much plot, aaaah*. **All plot actually.** ***Its 1 am and this is still a draft*** ****It’s 2am**** *****This post will be just be background I guess.*****

*******STAR WARS AU NO 9 LAZILY OUTLINED CHAPTER ONE*********

Force ghosts Darth Vader and Ben Kenobi have had time to yell at one another without need for breath, and have more-or-less come to terms with the trainwreck that was their shared life. I wouldn’t call them well adjusted, but they’re more stable then they were the last decade or so of their living existence.

In haunting Luke, they end up encountering an artifact in an ancient Willis temple that offers spirits the chance to fix the mistakes they made in life. It doesn’t truly unwrite what’s been done, but it lets you create an alternate timeline. So this galaxy will still be what it is, but some alternate galaxy somewhere could at least have it better. Its almost never been used, because becoming one with the force usually lets you accept the past, but viewed objectively, Vader and Ben’s lives involved an extreme amount of yikes. They say goodbye to Luke and are flung backwards and sideways.

Anakin is holding his mother as she dies. Obi-Wan is landing on Genosis.

Vader just barely manages to avoid slaughtering the tuskens. To be honest, he doesn’t really get why he shouldn’t- his moral compass is still pretty f-ed up. He’s fairly certain the force is just torturing him, but still he controls himself (for Padme for Luke for Leia).

I’m gonna say well-adjusted!Vader sees murder in general as more of a vice than a sin- on par with having a beer. And really well adjusted Vader is willing to admit to himself that he’s an alcoholic, he seriously cannot regulate, its a problem. He really can’t let himself go, because he’ll just end up spiraling. And so he restrains himself and only seriously maims a few of the adult raiders.

Vader figures he can always come back later and slowly torture them to death if this whole ‘save the future’ thing doesn’t pan out.

Obi-wan leaves his shuttle and hides under a rock for 30 minutes. He calculates thats just enough time for him to pretend he went on an extremely effective and sneaky fact finding mission- just in case anyone checks R4′s records. Gets back in shuttle and gets the fuck out of there, much to Dooku’s chagrin, who lost sight of him after the shuttle landed and is now going to have to switch to one of his alternate start-the-war plans.

On the flight back he reports everything to the council- fallen Dooku and the separatist leaders, the trade federation and the massive droid army, Jango Fett the clone template of the republic army (?) working for the separatists. He briefly comms Anakin, but anyone hacking into their conversations would hear only a nonsensical, rambling conversation. Later, a hacker might turn over the idea that they were speaking in elaborate code, but why would Jedi invent such a thing during peacetime?

The war still starts; at this point in the timeline it was inevitable; the artifact was only designed to give them the chance to correct their own failings, not the galaxy’s. Palpatine still gets his emergency powers.

The same day the armies are discovered, separatist war ships take off to engulf Ryloth. The Jedi are instructed by the senate to lead the clone army and provide immediate relief-this will not be a repeat of the republic’s inaction on Naboo. It’s both better and worse than the first Battle of Genosis. So many more civilians are caught in the crossfire. The first titanic battle is not contained to evacuated droid factories, but rages across an entire populated world. The battle lasts for weeks.

The main reason this fight is less deadly is solely due to the fact that General Kenobi manages to maneuver his way into high command of the entire army.

“I believe assumptions were made since I was the first point of contact with Kamino, Masters,” the Knight explained apologetically to the arriving high council members. “I realize its not quite appropriate, but for right now I am the Jedi most familiar with our forces and the enemies. I would, of course, prefer to cede the role to someone else.”

The assembled Jedi can feel the truth in that statement.

“For better or for worse, advance troops were directed by the senate to land planetside and have met heavy resistance. I managed to redirect them to a more defensible position, where they can provide surface based cover fire for incoming reinforcements. The battle has already begun.” He received a grim nod of approval from Master Windu.

“I feel the need to say now, that if there’s one thing I learned from my time as a general on Melida/Dann, or in working against Death Watch on Mandalore, its that having a clear chain of command is vital for a military to succeed. I don’t need to remind some of you that leadership breakdowns were what ultimately ended both the Stark Hyperspace War and the Yinchorri Crisis,” Masters Koon and Tiin exchanged looks before deliberately sending forth a small force wave of approval, understanding where this briefing was leading.

“I believe that unnecessarily restructuring command before the battle is won here could do far more harm than good.” The reminder of Obi-wan’s unusually militaristic apprenticeship put some of the assembled knights at ease even as it inspired a twinge of guilt in the older masters.

“In command you are, General Kenobi,” Master Yoda finally acknowledged. “A Jedi Master you will be, once done this battle is. Have us do, what would you?”

The battle lasts for weeks, and when its over, the commanding Jedi and Troopers involved will openly acknowledge that had anyone else been in command, it would’ve lasted months, if not years. Facing down logistical, strategic, and tactical problems on a scale unheard of for a thousand years, High General Kenobi does not falter.

Enemy reinforcements seem unending. For all their preparation, every single trooper is new to war, and secretly concerned that should they fall, they will be replaced with cadets who hadn’t even finished their training.

Obi-Wan is putting out fires before they can start. Much to their shock, clone commanders are informed that they will, for the time being, remain in charge of their troops. With a handful of exceptions, Jedi ‘Generals’ were in fact, to be treated as a cross between highly skilled commandoes and advisors with abnormally sourced field intelligence.

“All of you have spent your lives training to lead your brothers into combat. The Jedi Masters and knights who are being assigned to your divisions have not received such training.”

General Kenobi addressed the division commanders, some in person, some over holocomm. All focused in rapt attention as their General reordered the shape of their lives using language they could understand.

“The command structure I am issuing is designed to maximize our ability to utilize our respective strategic capabilities, while minimizing potential loss of your life. It will be our great privilege to serve alongside such an army, and while I fully expect a complementary exchange of knowledge in time, for now, focus on survival.”

The Jedi received similar briefings, tailored for their broader array of combat and military experience. Some, including Jedi Master Pong Krell and Grandmaster Yoda, were pulled aside and tasked with the essential mission of infiltrating and destroying the Droid factories on Genosis. If they were to have a chance of winning this war, they they would need to cut off the seemingly unceasing flow of droid reinforcements.

An elite squadron of Arctroopers and Jedi field operatives were covertly dispatched, Grandmaster Yoda himself in command. Considering Count Dooku had yet to appear anywhere near Ryloth...the grandmaster had the best chance of bringing in the fallen separatist leader alive for questioning.

Shortly after they left, Anakin arrived, having finally turned over Padme’s protection to her regular guard. With the military creation vote past, the assassination risk was considered minimal. The real delay in his arrival came from her repeated attempts to join the Grand Army of the Republic on Ryloth with the intent of coordinating humanitarian assistance. Eventually he managed to convince her that she could do more good in the senate.

After all, he pointed out, someone would need to followup the military creation act with a bill to grant clones equal citizen rights. Otherwise, the legal grey area that cloning fell under and their non-republic origin would inadvertently make the clones slaves.

His borrowed Nabooan cruiser entered the warzone with the grace and efficiency as a small neutron bomb.

Those close enough to see its flaming descent watched in horror, realizing that the high generals own padawan would likely be a war casualty before he ever engaged in combat.

The legion nearest to soon-to-be-ground-zero, under the command of Captain Rex of the 501st, were distracted by heated combat, as the temporary barricade they had put up to defend the civilian population gave way to droidika artillery.

While reloading, several dozen troopers happened to look up to see a speck detach itself from the hull as at spiraled in the lower atmosphere. Hope spread that the Jedi had managed to activate some sort of eject hatch. A skilled shocktrooper could probably control and and survive such a fall with luck, which mean a Jedi almost certainly could.

A few tactical scouts charged with watching the skies confirmed that the speck was indeed a humanoid. No chute was visible, but even 8 days into the war, rumors had already spread about how Master Windu had passed off his chute mid-air to a troopers who had been damaged by suppressing fire, cushioning his free fall solely with the tank he crushed upon landing.

Only one trooper, stationed in the town clock tower specifically to track the Padawan’s arrival and issued with a high-resolution farscope, saw the whole thing. Fortunately for his credibility later, in its current setting, the scope automatically logged photos every 5 seconds, ensuring that for years to come Obi-Wan would have a flipbook as evidence that he was not the crazy one.

CT-3609 or Blink (as he was named after winning the division wide staring contest on Kamino two year prior) forwarded the trajectory of the vehicle to command, who confirmed his analysis that it would impact two clicks out from their makeshift fort and not present a risk to civilian or trooper lives.

As it traversed the stratosphere a figure (desperate repair droid, Blink assumed) emerged from the cockpit to perch on the nose of the ship. As it entered the troposphere, it became painfully obvious that the figure jutting out from the hull of the ship was in fact not a humanoid droid, but an unarmored human. The Jedi stood on the prow of the ship, seemingly impervious to and oblivious of:

air resistance

centrifugal force

normal space gravity

Blink’s slack-jawed bewilderment

the flames engulfing the ship below him

At this range, the smirk on the man’s face was visible (man? boy? kriff is he even through puberty?). Several miles above the surface he leaped, diving towards the ground like a bird of prey.

To the west, the ship made impact with the ground, sending a shockwave that shook the tower just enough for Blink to lose visual in the final moments of descent. Cursing, as while he was confident the Jedi would inexplicably survive, he really wanted to see how. The trooper scanned the droid-engulfed farmland to the north for a crash site, to no avail. Lingering smoke from the burnt countryside negatively impacted visibility low to the ground.

Rather than trying to articulate his report into words, he sent the 50-odd frames the farscope had saved, as well as the coordinates for the jedi’s projected radius of touchdown. A quick radio over to long range electro-ballistics ensured that his landing wouldn’t be marred by friendly fire.

He awaited follow-up questions on the absurd entry method, which, when they came, mostly consisted of variations on “...Is this for real?” and eventually “Can you set the scope to video for a little while?” and finally “Do you think that’s how he got the name Skywalker?”

There was a temporarily lull in fire from the west, likely a ripple effect from the ship’s explosion. From his vantage point Blink could see his batchmates using the opportunity to try and plug the holes in their barricade with broken droid pieces. Regardless of the itch to join them, he knew he couldn’t leave his post until the Jedi actually arrived in camp. Finally, a distant explosion and thick pillar of smoke gave the Jedi’s position away.

He tried to make out details, but the scope had a difficult time focusing through the haze. Manually trying to fine tune the scope’s settings, Blink caught a glimpse of what looked like half a hover tank sailing through the air to impact with a trade federation troop carrier in a fiery explosion. Several more explosions, flying droid artillery, and plumes of smoke were caught on record before visual contact with the source was established. He was mostly visible as a blue blur, lightsaber mowing a meandering path towards their location.

It wasn’t until Skywalker braced himself in place to punch a droidaka into pieces that Blink caught actual sight of the man. Only his eyes were visible, nose and mouth covered by layers of cloth. He blurred, then reappeared on top a massive missile launcher attached to an absurdly heavily armored vehicle. A minute or so of rapid blue flashes passed, the longest he had seen concentrated in one area. Then Skywalker was gone, movement clearly visible as he for once he moved in a straight line, plowing a rapid path away from the launcher.

Less than 30 seconds later, Blink had to wince away from the scope, as a burning white explosion temporarily overwhelmed the direct light filter. The trooper panicked for a moment, thinking he had gone both deaf and blind, but the abrupt, sucking silence ended after a moment with a deafening sonic boom. The shockwave rattled the farscope, nearly knocking it over, but Blink managed to steady it and himself in time.

A cheer emerged from pleasantly surprised vod below. The entire droid legion that had been guarding the missile launcher and apparent ordinance bay was flattened.

It took a moment for the realization to set in that the background noise of missile and and anti-missile collisions directly overhead had slowed pace. With the northern flank gone, artillery were able to redouble efforts to the east, and a second white hot shockwave ensued, signaling that the tide of battle had shifted. It was almost too easy for the republics electro-ballistics to tactically devastate the surrounding forces.

Eventually some sort of win/loss programming must have set in and all forces outside of a certain radius began retreating southward, conceding the scorched land to the republic army. It was cadets work to clean up the final suicidal droid charge.

A commotion ensued as Skywalker leapt the barricade with a mid-air flip. The vod greeted him with cheers, as they correctly assumed his appearance had something to do with the skirmish’s decisive victory.

Blink sent the video of the battle to command and quickly packed up his scope and assorted equipment. Hurrying down the battered tower, Blink thought to himself that this Anakin Skywalker was the best sort of Jedi a trooper could ask for.

uh sorry i got really sidetracked there moving on

Kenobi and Skywalker quickly become the face of the war once again

they grit their teeth a bit, but when they finally have a moment to really plan they eventually agree that to take down Sideous they have to cut off his political power in addition to everything else, and taking advantage of their public personas was the most accessible way to do so (*evil laughter*)

While Dooku wasn’t captured, Yoda heard the truth in his old student’s cryptic warnings about a Sith in the Senate, and the council begins carefully editing their release of tactical plans to the Chancellor’s office in the hopes of ferreting out the spy in their midst.

Pong Krell looses two arms in his duel with Dooku. Obi-Wan successfully hides his smug pleasure at the news. Anakin enjoys makeing comparisons between him and Grievous.

Kenobi doesn’t allow the origin of the clones to go unexamined, although he agrees that if the public were informed that they don’t actually know who ordered them it would probably cause panic.

The ‘inhibitor chips’ are ‘discovered’ early on and Anakin leads the effort to ensure that they are phased out and removed immediately. This consists of reminding every Jedi who even hesitates about how how he as a child slave had some experience with control chips and unless you want to take a leaf out of the hutts books lets start doing brain surgery chop chop mmmkay?

(This isn’t to say that Vader doesn’t still a twinge of shame at acknowledging his slave roots. But it is eclipsed by the burning guilt that he knowingly acted as slave master to his troops for decades after Sideous wiped their minds. He tried to rationalize it to himself, after all he didn’t immediately understand what Order 66 had done to the troopers. But while the morality of murder was more of an intellectual concern than a personal one, treating people as things...)

The Kamonions are a little harder to budge, referencing contracts that they refuse to allow the Jedi to see

Finally Vader snuck into the Chief Medical Scientist’s home while she was sleeping and straight-up threatened to murder her and burn down her lab. At the risk of losing her life’s work, Nala Se complied.

Vader left with the final threat that in the event that Darth Tyranus caught wind and activated Order 66 prematurely, he would kill 100 Kamonians for every Jedi felled by troopers. Shaak Ti was pleased by the cloners sudden change of heart. Tyrannus, and by extension, Sideous, are in the dark.

Obi-Wan frequently publicly confronts Palpatine about the troops citizen status, urging him make use of his emergency powers to grant them citizenship and full pay, with the option to leave the army should they so wish.

Anakin manages to play off his avoidance of the Chancellor as disappointment in his perceived lack of dedication to anti-slavery efforts

Finally Palpatine gives in- regardless of what happens next, the troops will be looked after.

With 2/3rds of the troopers dechipped, Vaderkin is eager to kill Sideous again, but after several intense screaming matches and sparring sessions, the time travelers come to the agreement that even if they succeed in their duel, with things as they were, the perception of the Jedi military coop would cause mass civil unrest. The scattered sith apprentices, while individually weak, were more than capable of magnifying that fear and anger until the galaxy breaks. Darth Sideous wanted to ensure that if he couldn’t have the galaxy, no one would.

(Vader knows this. Sideous enjoyed monologuing, and much of his plotting couldn’t be safely bragged about until after he had decisively won, leaving Vader as the unwilling receptacle for years of pent-up rants and self-satisfied gloats about the inevitability of his victory)

Continued Here

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wanderinginksplot · 4 years

Text

Nobody Listens to Kix

Previous | Next | Masterlist

Case 01053: Hardcase (Yet Again)

Kix kept a clean medbay. Not only was it a necessity, but he took pride in cleanliness. He tucked starched sheets under the last medbay mattress and took a step back to admire his handiwork.

The beds were neatly made, sheets and blankets folded to crisp GAR standard. Every medical tool had been sanitized and tucked back into its proper place. Kix had even found time to organize his medical cabinet and desk - as long as one ignored the stack of uncompleted paperwork. The floor shone so uniformly that it almost served as a mirror to reflect the perfection of the rest of the empty medbay.

"Hey, Kix!"

Kix's shoulders immediately shot toward his ears as the peace of the medbay was shattered by a too-familiar voice, and the medic immediately started making his way toward his desk by the entrance.

"Hardcase," he groaned on the way, his view of the hapless trooper blocked by one of the privacy curtains separating the beds from the medbay entrance. "If you come in here any more often, I'm going to start charging you rent for a bed."

Hardcase laughed, but the sound ended in a pained wheeze. Kix stepped around a privacy curtain to find that the trooper was being held up by Appo and Fledge, both of whom were trying to support as much of Hardcase's weight as possible. Kix would have to make a full exam to be sure, but it looked like Hardcase was suffering from what was at very least a severely sprained joint in one leg.

"Put him on the bed, men," Kix ordered, motioning toward the first bed in the neat row.

As they did as Kix had said, Hardcase's eyes closed, his tattooed face tense. When Appo accidentally jostled the leg that seemed to be damaged, Hardcase let out a curse so loud that his voice broke before he could finish it.

With a quick scan, Kix found that Hardcase had a broken leg, a sprained elbow, and no fewer than four fractured ribs. Worse of all, one of the fractures had released miniscule bone shards that were perilously close to reaching one of Hardcase's lungs. If a clone's lungs were injured, there was no attempt at healing them. They were marked for immediate transport to Kamino for reconditioning.

After stifling the urge to throw the datapad that showed the results of the scan, Kix snapped, "What the kriff were you doing that caused this many injuries? Of all the shabiir, or'dinii, jare'la things you've done, nothing's ever been this bad-"

"It wasn't his fault!" Fledge argued, flinching back slightly at Kix's glare. "It wasn't, though!"

Kix turned to Appo for confirmation and the trooper nodded. "We were in the gym and Hardcase was working out on the overhead chest press machine when the cords snapped. All the weights tipped the machine over and they fell out onto him."

Kix shook his head and rested a hand on Hardcase's shoulder. "Sorry, vod. I'll get you something for the pain before we do anything else."

Hardcase nodded, but didn't say anything. Kix couldn't blame him. Judging from the panting he was doing, he was minutes from vomiting or passing out entirely. Though he was grateful, Kix honestly couldn't believe the trooper had avoided doing either so far.

Considering the pain level he was working with, Kix opted to inject pain meds rather than wait for pills to dissolve and enter the trooper's bloodstream naturally. When Hardcase's breathing had slowed, he relaxed into the bed, eyes fluttering as he struggled to stay awake.

"Let go, vod," Kix encouraged softly. "I'll take care of everything."

Hardcase nodded again and slipped into something between sleep and unconsciousness.

"What are you going to do?" Fledge asked.

Kix's answer - when it came - was blunt and grim. "There isn't much I can do for him. I'll try using one of the onboard medical droids, but Hardcase might need to visit a hospital on Coruscant."

Appo paled. "Will the Republic pay for him to be treated, or will they just send him back to Kamino?"

"It depends on how much he can heal in that time," Kix answered with a helpless shrug. As the two left the medbay, he could see that they weren't happy with his answer, but Kix was equally unhappy. There was a good reason he didn't use the medical droids that were intended to staff the medbay. Not only did the men respond better to treatment by an organic, but the droids also had a 55% chance of correctly diagnosing and treating a problem. It didn't inspire confidence in anyone, least of all Kix.

He went to the closet that stored the droids and, after the first medical droid had powered up, said, "There's a patient with a broken leg and a sprained elbow. I need you to set the leg and put a wrap on the elbow."

The droid nodded at him and made its slow, plodding way over to the unconscious Hardcase. Kix watched it for a moment, wondering idly why anyone had bothered making a medical droid look so much like an organic when it obviously struggled to move around.

However, he had bigger problems. Kix could loosely bind Hardcase's ribs to help them heal, but the shards were the biggest concern. Even if they didn't continue toward his lungs, they could pose a risk to his heart. Kix was no surgeon and, even if he was, there was danger in performing a surgery on a Republic ship in the middle of the Outer Rim. The 501st was traveling with General Unduli, Commander Offee, and several companies of the 41st Elite Corps, but that didn't make them safe from threats.

Abruptly, Kix had an idea. He left the medical droid treating Hardcase's leg and made his way to Commander Tano's cabin. She opened the door at his knock and stared up at him curiously. "Kix?"

Kix saluted. "Commander Tano. We have a situation in the medbay. Do you know where Commander Offee is?"

"I'm here, trooper," Commander Offee said, stepping up behind Commander Tano.

"What's going on?" Ahsoka asked, retrieving her lightsabers and fastening them to the belts crossed at her hips.

"Medical situation, sir," Kix told her, turning to Commander Offee. "I've seen you Force-heal. Can you do it without supervision?"

"It- it depends on the injury, I think," Commander Offee said slowly.

"I have a trooper with broken ribs and bone chips near one of his lungs," Kix reported. "Could you do anything about that?"

The young Mirialan commander paled to a sickly-looking jade. "Moving solid objects is a challenge. Normally, Force-healing is a gentle internal nudge to speed and guide the body's natural healing processes. Moving bone chips would be dangerous, if not impossible."

Kix pondered that. "Could you build up the cells of the lung to keep it from being penetrated by the shards?"

Commander Offee shook her head slowly. "It would stop the shards from piercing his lung, but it would also put undue stress on it. He would likely find it difficult to breathe and, depending on the severity of the build-up, could cause his body to react in unexpected ways."

There was another thoughtful pause in the conversation until she offered, "Perhaps I could assist while you perform surgery?"

"That's a negative, Commander," Kix refused flatly. "Surgery is too dangerous until we get to the Inner Rim. By then, the Republic may have decided that it's more cost-efficient to replace him."

"Kix!" Commander Tano reprimanded sharply.

Kix shrugged at her. "It's the truth, Commander. The GAR won't put too much money into clone health; we've seen that time and time again."

From Commander Tano's frown, she accepted his explanation but not the practice behind it. "Why don't you just heal the tissue behind the shards and let his body push them back toward his ribs? Then you could fuse them back in and heal his ribs at the same time."

Commander Offee and Kix stared at her in shock until Commander Tano grew visibly uncomfortable. "What?"

"Commander," Kix said slowly, "I could kiss you right now."

"Excuse me?"

Kix turned and saluted in one motion. It had been a good reflex since Captain Rex was walking down the hall toward them, his expression dark.

"Nothing, sir," Kix answered quickly.

"Hey, Rex," Commander Tano greeted cheerfully.

"Commanders, your generals need you on the bridge," Rex told them.

Both Jedi nodded and Commander Tano drew Rex away while Commander Offee murmured, "I'll report to the medbay as soon as I can."

"Thank you, Commander," Kix said fervently.

Rex stayed behind while the young commanders made their way to the bridge. "Trooper, do you have inappropriate feelings for Commander Offee?"

"No, sir," Kix said simply, fighting back a grin.

Rex's face grew, if possible, even more foreboding. "Commander Tano, then?"

This time, Kix chuckled aloud. Ignoring that it was a terrible idea to fall for a Jedi, the entire 501st would cheerfully de-spine the first brother to get inappropriate with Ahsoka. She could take care of herself, but the 501st had seen what General Secura and her men had to put up with and had sworn that no one would speak that way about their commander, not while any of them were around.

Realizing that Rex was still waiting for an answer, Kix said, "No, sir."

Rex relaxed minutely. "I'll be on the bridge, then. How is Hardcase?"

The weight of responsibility crashed back down on the medic's shoulders. "He's out for right now. We'll have to see how well he heals before we get to the Inner Rim."

Rex clapped a hand on Kix's shoulder and left for the bridge.

When Kix got back to the medbay, Hardcase was just beginning to stir.

"Kix?" he asked softly.

Kix was by the bedside immediately. "I'm here, vod."

"Are they gonna send me back to Kamino?"

"No," Kix growled, knowing that the ferocity in his voice was too intense for the situation, but unable to help himself. "We'll find a way to fix everything, Hardcase. I promise."

"Good," Hardcase said with satisfaction, closing his eyes again like he didn't have a care in the world. "I want to die in battle."

Kix laughed dryly. "With your grasp of strategy? I'm sure you will."

With a weak, faux-wounded smirk, Hardcase fell asleep once more. Kix stayed until Commander Offee appeared, Commander Tano in tow.

He gave Hardcase a mild sedative so he wouldn't move too much during the efforts to heal his ribs. It was a slow process, one that left Kix feeling frustrated and helpless as Commander Offee strained and sweated to heal the trooper in ways Kix never could.

All of those ugly feelings disappeared when she stepped away and shot him a weary smile. "His ribs are intact. I helped repair some of the minor fractures in his leg and started the recovery in his elbow. I would like to do more, but I must rest first."

"His ribs are completely healed?" Kix checked, and Commander Offee nodded. "Thank you, sir. I can't tell you how much this means to me. To all of us."

"It was a pleasure to be of assistance," she replied gracefully.

She and Commander Tano left the medbay as Kix offered his thanks once more. He was alone with a sleeping Hardcase and a veritable heap of paperwork, but Kix couldn't bring himself to do anything more than sit by Hardcase's bedside, filled with gratitude toward the Jedi.

---

A/N - if you want to believe this comes after Umbara and Hardcase is still alive, feel free. If you want to believe that Kix mis-numbered his files and Umbara is still exactly as it was in canon, feel free. Whatever works best for you!

#Nobody Listens to Kix #star wars #star wars the clone wars #star wars fanfiction #clone trooper kix #clone trooper hardcase #commander barriss offee #commander ahsoka tano #captain rex #clone trooper appo #clone troopers deserve better #more to come

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basura2319 · 4 years

Text

Who lives, who dies

Pairing: Rex x reader (gender neutral)

Anonymous said:

“Hey! I’ve recently gotten back into the clone wars and Rex has stolen my heart 😂 would you be willing to do a Rex x Jedi!Reader but with a bit of angst where it’s older Rex in the Rebels series and he talks about the reader to Ezra? I hope that made sense 😂”

WC: 2.5K

Warnings: Takes place in Rebels, Ezra being nosy, angst, character death, blood, *S7 spoilers for tcw finale*, and things in italics are flashbacks.

A/N: I hope I did this fic some justice and sorry for making you wait so long. I had to force myself to rewatch the last episode a second time because that episode really messed me up, anyone else feel that way?

Rex never thought that he would be serving again since the Clone Wars. But times were changing and ever since the Ghost Crew came to him for help, he thought long and hard about joining a cause like the Rebellion. And when he did, it made him feel almost happy that he was doing something purposeful again. Something he’s choosing to be a part of. But at the same time, whenever he went on missions and saw rebels dying, ones he grew newly acquainted with, it brought back tons of memories he spent so much time on Seelos trying to repress.

Memories of his dying brothers, of Anakin and Ahsoka, and especially of you. Which was why he was outside of Chopper Base. Sleep eluded him right now and on those days when couldn’t sleep, he went outside to sit underneath Atollon’s night sky to think.

He sat on one of the crates by the shooting range and pulled out a hologram. With shaky hands, he turns it on and a tentative smile falls onto his lips at the image he sees.

It was a hologram of him—his younger self—and you, smiling at each other. Judging by the clothes you both wore, someone could look at the hologram and never guess that he was a soldier and you were a Jedi knight. But you were more than just a Jedi; you were his love. His everything. And this hologram, Rex thought, was his most prized possession. Because showed it a time in his life when he was in utter bliss. A feeling he would never have again.

Rex felt tears begin to build up as he gazes over your face again for the thousandth time. The light in your (e/c) eyes as you look to Rex and the crinkle on the edges of your eyes as you smiled. He remembered the day this hologram was taken. You convinced Rex to join you on a night around Coruscant. You had been the one to take the image without his knowing and you gave him a copy of it to keep. Since then, he has kept it with him at all times, as it is the only thing he has to remember you by.

He blinks the wetness in his eyes away. How he wished things turned out different. If only he believed Fives. If only he didn’t answer that incoming call from the Chancellor. If only they got out of the blazing cruiser fast enough. If only—

CRASH!

Rex immediately clicked the hologram shut and reached for his blaster, aiming at whatever made the crates behind him, he noted, fall over.

“Whose there” He growled. “Show yourself.”

It was probably those Atollon spiders again. How did they get inside the base?

“Relax! It’s just me!” said a panicked voice behind the crates. “Ezra!”

Rex sighed in relief. It was just the kid.

“What are you doing here?” asked Rex in exasperation, giving the boy a stern glare.

“I would ask you the same thing,” Ezra replied with raised brow. “Seeing as how you’re just…sitting here, doing what exactly?”

“That is none of your business,” said Rex sternly.

“Okay then,” he said sheepishly. “Well I guess my being here is none of your business so—”

“Ezra.”

“Alright,” he groaned. “I came out here to practice my lightsaber forms, see.” He waved his lightsaber around as proof. “And well…”

Ezra stared at the ground in shame. “And then I saw you by yourself a-and I didn’t mean to spy on you. I was—”

“Kid,” sighed Rex, feeling a slight tingle of warmth reach his face. “It’s alright.”

Rex shouldn’t feel embarrassed. It’s not like he could in trouble for possessing the only image of you he had. And it’s not like Ezra understood the context of what he saw.

He opened his mouth to say something but stopped seeing the way Ezra looked at him. Something akin to concern? Pity? The young boy looked as if he had more to say.

“Something wrong?”

“No—it’s,” Ezra said hesitantly. “That person—in that hologram— I know them.”

Rex furrowed his brows in confusion. “How?” You died before Ezra was born.

“Kanan has these holo-recordings he’s been showing me,” Ezra began. “They’re mainly Jedi Knights teaching how to do a certain form. I saw them teaching a session on how to do the Soresu form, their name, I think, is—”

“Jedi Knight (Y/N) (L/N),” Rex finished hoarsely. The first time in a while since he had said your name out loud.

“You don’t have to answer this,” Ezra said with a curious tone in his voice. “But, did you work with them?”

Rex smiled, recalling all the adventures you both had. “I did, in fact (Y/N) was part of Torrent Company.”

He sat back down on the crate and so did Ezra. “I met them a little after I met Commander Tano.” He chuckled. “They came in to save our forces after the disastrous stunt we pulled off in Felucia. Had they not came in to rescue us, we would have died trying to fend off those clankers.”

Rex, in his mind, remembered it all. You coming out of nowhere with gunships, screaming at Anakin to fall back. He recalled Skywalker being almost stunned at your presence.

“What are you doing all the way out here (Y/N),” Rex remembered Anakin asking you as they got inside the gunships.

“Here to save your ass,” you commented back. “Only this time from a battlefield instead of from Master Kenobi.”

Anakin chuckled. “Always with the quip remarks.”

“We both trained together since we were kids,” you stated with an arched brow. “Why are you surprised?”

“So you’re a general now?” he asked.

“No,” you answered with a knowing grin. “But I am assigned to one.”

“No way!”

You threw your head back and laughed. “You better believe it.”

“Well then, I should introduce to my second in command, other than you,” he said, smirking at the offended huff you made. “Meet Captain Rex.”

He remembered you reaching out to him as you hung to the straps of the gunship to shake his hand. “Hello Captain, I’m (Y/N) (L/N), but please call me (Y/N).”

He was so entranced by your smile that he almost forgot you were speaking to him.

“Nice to meet you (Y/N),” he said, silently thanking the force that he had his helmet on so you couldn’t see the tinge of red in his cheeks. “And please, call me Rex.”

Rex smiled at the memory. “(Y/N) was a very clever Jedi, but most importantly they were compassionate. They treated us clones like equals and was always there to listen and understand our grievances.”

“They sound amazing,” Ezra replied. “I would’ve loved to meet them.”

Rex paused. “I think (Y/N) would’ve loved to train you and certainly wouldn’t hesitate for a second to be apart of this rebellion if they knew what became of the Republic we both swore to protect.”

His smile disappeared. He really wished you were here to see this.

Ezra looked to Rex with sadness. He could feel the clone veteran’s grief so strongly and could also feel his love for you; just like how he could feel the love between his parents as a kid before the Empire took that all away.

“They didn’t make because if the order did they?”

“No…” said Rex hoarsely. “If it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t even be here…”

Everything fell apart after Mandalore.

He had no idea he was going to be forced to kill (Y/N) and Ahsoka by just one simple command that was enough to overpower his senses.

While Ahsoka managed to escape the blaster fire from him and his men, he was relieved to learn after his chip was removed that you were in your quarters when the order happen, giving you time to hide in the vents.

He was so afraid that his men might’ve gotten you. But he could see the fear and realization on your face when he woke up from his chip removal.

“Fives…” you said in a hushed voice as you three ran to open the hangar doors. “He was right about everything.”

Rex reached for your hand and gave a hard squeeze. “I know, but it weren’t for him, I would’ve killed…”

He couldn’t say it. The thought of you or Ahsoka being executed out of his own will, he—

He just didn’t want to imagine it.

But things worsened. The cruiser was beginning to break apart as they got out of hyperspace and the cruiser was on its way to crashing on a moon.

His men. His brothers who he loved so much, were all waiting for them at the main hangar. Willing to kill themselves trying to complete the mission.

Tears were streaming down his face as he argued this realization to you and Ahsoka.

You knew more than anyone how he felt. Removing his helmet, you pressed you forehead against his in affection. “Rex…it’s okay. I know your brothers. Ahsoka and I know that they are good soldiers and this isn’t their fault.”

He knew they might not have a chance in finding a ship and leaving, but he went with the plan of trying to reason with Jesse, his little vod, on not killing you or Ahsoka. But Rex already knew his brother was long gone, lost somewhere in his mind. He was desperate when it didn’t work and they kept firing at them.

To add to the ongoing mess of things, their chance of escape was taken away by Maul when he took the last remaining shuttle.

They were reaching the moon’s surface rapidly and running out of time.

“Wait,” you called out to Rex. “I see another unharmed ship. There!” You pointed to the Y-wing bomber.

You deflected the blaster shots away as you three ran towards it. Using the force, you wasted no time in pushing Rex towards the ship and jumping your way over.

“There’s only two seats!” exclaimed Rex in panic. “What do we do?”

Your heart seized at the problem. You looked over at Ahsoka who you realized didn’t make it over to the ship, still trying to hold the clones back. She wasn’t going to last long.

“Rex…” you called out, voice strained.

He looked to you, face contorted in anxiety. “What is it?”

You took his helmet off so you could stare at his face one last time. “You know that I love you, right?” you said breathlessly. “More than anything, more than life itself…”

“Y/N stop—“

You kissed him, one last time, savoring his lips as tears leaked from your eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

You shut the cockpit canopy before he could stop you. “I hope one day you can forgive me.”

He was screaming your name and it broke your heart in two. Rex tried opening the canopy but it was too late.

“Ahsoka go!” You force pushed the clones out of the way and continued to deflect your lightsaber against their firing.

“No, I’m not—”

You didn’t let her finish. Using your remaining strength, you push your friend towards the ship. Rex felt the cruiser begin to tilt, watching how it made you lose your balance and fall towards the opening of the hangar. The cruisers billowing speed and harsh winds caused the Y-wing bomber to fly out before Rex and Ahsoka had a chance to help you.

As Rex gained control of the ship, he maneuvered through the rubble trying to see if you were alive, possibly hanging onto debris. He didn’t see you. Instead moments later, he found your mangled body in the debris along with his brothers.

He fell to his knees, gathering your body in his arms and wept. His watery eyes gazed at your form, noting the blood matted on your head that must’ve been from something blunt that collided with your head. The dried blood from your nose and mouth. And the most haunting thing of all was your (e/c) eyes, staring lifelessly at the sky.

It only made him cry out in anguish.

Ahsoka watched from afar as her friend mourn, silently crying at everything that went down. She felt the connection between her and her master die and now, you were gone too. To save her and Rex.

Rex reached a shaky hand over to close your eyes. He didn’t want to leave you here, but what choice did he have? Someone was going to come to evaluate the site soon. They had to leave.

Rex and Ahsoka took one last look at the burial site they made and left with a creeping feeling of numbness. When they went into orbit, Rex stared at the moon below while reaching for his necklace that held the hologram of you he hid under his shirt.

Pressing the device to his lips he whispered, “I love you… and I forgive you, my cyare”

They made the jump to hyperspace, uncertain of what their future would entail now.

***

“Did you ever go back to the crash site?” Ezra asked a little after Rex finished talking.

“No,” sighed Rex. “The place for all I know could be swarming with Imperial probe droids or they probably took whatever they deemed important.”

Ezra reached over to put a hand on his shoulder in a comforting gesture. “I might not know (Y/N), but from what you’ve told me, I think they would be proud of where you are now.”

Rex smiled at the young Jedi. “I’d like to think so too.”

***

All beings become one with the Force after death.

That’s what you’ve been told along with all Jedi.

Yet you didn’t feel like you were apart of the Force. Sure you could feel it binding you, but it was nothing like you’ve imagined. You thought that after death, you wouldn’t recall your past life, but you did. Or that you wouldn’t be aware of anything that’s happening in the universe.

You are able to see and acknowledge what’s become of this universe. And you're horrified of it. You’re horrified of what you know.

The only thing you’re thankful for is that the one’s you cared about made it out alive.

Ahsoka, you gathered, is following a path you knew suited her apart from the Jedi ways and you couldn’t be even more happy for her.

As for Rex, you never left his side after death, just not in the way you expected. He couldn’t see you. No one could unless they were Jedi. But that only happened when you wanted to be seen.

But you’ve watched over him after all this time and watched his struggle in adjusting to a new life as a free man. That didn’t mean you couldn’t feel his guilt though. His guilt that he lived whereas his brothers didn’t and lastly, his guilt over you.

You were filled with sadness whenever he grieved over you, like what he was doing now. Sitting by himself, staring at the hologram you gifted him.

You hated that you couldn’t talk to him or that you couldn’t give him some sort of comfort. There was so much you wanted to say to him, but oh how you couldn’t wait to speak to him to again. It’s only a matter of time.

For now, all you can do now is be in his presence, wishing he knew you were here.

#requests #captain rex #captain rex x reader #commander rex #commander rex x reader

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creative-frequency · 5 years

Text

Inquisitor!Cal Kestis x Reader: Free Time

Word count: 1564 Pairing: Inquisitor!Cal Kestis x Reader Notes: I had a mighty need for inquisitor Cal, asked what kind of scenarios would you guys like to read and here we go.

My Writing Masterlist

He is always training.

Alone.

You don’t know much about this new Inquisitor who some call unofficially the Eleventh Brother. There would be plenty enough numbers available among the first ten. Some even whisper that he is the next Grand Inquisitor. He doesn’t look that special to you, but you don’t want to go close enough to get a better look.

With the way he handles the red lightsaber, it’s clear that he is no stranger to the weapon. After a few sparring matches, the Purge Troopers quickly learned to avoid him in training spaces. Everyone gives him a wide berth.

Former Jedi Cal Kestis is always training because when he isn’t, he can hear his own thoughts, screaming inside his head. There is no one to talk to, no one to drown the thoughts with. The other Inquisitors barely treat him as equal, most often settling for avoidance. The feeling is mutual.

Cal feels the yearning for companionship, but there is none he can trust now. None who would comfort or encourage him. Getting physically exhausted and falling into dreamless sleep makes his new life somewhat more bearable. There is no light in his existence now. Just aimless darkness where he wanders, trying to hold his head above the surface. He is just surviving.

Attending to your duties at the Fortress Inquisitorius, you have no time to stare at the new Inquisitor, as handsome as he may be. He is swinging the double-bladed lightsaber in a speed that makes you dizzy. You don’t like the way the Second Sister looks at him, like a trophy from a hunt. It makes you feel sick but there is nothing you can do, especially show your disgust.

Nur wouldn’t have been your first choice, but one can’t exactly say no to a direct order. So you just focus on the job and hope that a new order will come soon.

It’s been two years.

Working in maintenance isn’t the most exciting career under the rule of the Galactic Empire. At least you don’t have to torture or murder anyone, only look the other way when someone else does. Things like that tend to numb people. You’re not proud of it. You’re just surviving.

Most of your coworkers are droids. Sometimes you hear people joking that you’re leading an army of your own. You tend to avoid the Troopers and especially the Inquisitors. Keeping a low profile is not just the best tactic to stay alive on the planet, it’s a necessity.

With a job that mainly requires only hands, you have too much time to think and wait for the comlink to spark into life.

“Requiring maintenance on residential level. Over.”

An everyday occurrence. You sigh. “What seems to be the problem? Over.”

“Another blasted lock. Apartment 2-5-7-K. Over.”

Gripping the comlink, you bite your lip. Shit. Anything over 250 means it’s an Inquisitor’s door. You’d best hurry.

“I’m on my way. Over.”

A blasted lock. You wonder what the reason is this time. What Trooper was stupid enough to draw a weapon in the hallways? They probably paid for the insolence with their life. Maybe there was a skirmish with one of the prisoners or someone tried to escape. Wouldn’t be the first time. You try to think of something else.

The hallway is fortunately empty so you speed walk to the right door. 257K. After a short inspection it seems that the lock is not actually broken, the door just needs some basic maintenance. The room hasn’t been in use for a long time but apparently someone has moved in recently. You make a mental note to bump it higher up on the priority list and to make sure a droid is taking care of it.

“It just needs adjustment, right?”

A scream almost flees you and you drop the servodriver.

The red-head Inquisitor stands next to you, slightly crouched to see better what you’re doing. You didn’t hear anyone approaching.

“Would’ve fixed it myself if I had the tools,” he continues, ignoring your almost heart attack.

“I’m sorry! This’ll be ready in a minute,” you say hastily and try not to look at the freckles on his face.

The Inquisitor’s brows crease closer together when you don’t look him in the eye.

“Okay,” he simply replies and leans against the wall, arms folding on his chest and looking like he isn’t going anywhere soon. If anything, he seems to enjoy watching you panic. A light smirk on his face and all.

You feel the eyes on your back as you work as fast as you can, checking and testing the connectors. Some of them need to be changed soon and that requires another order of spare parts. You just love paperwork and spending the Empire’s credits.

“Can you take a look at the AC inside? It’s been acting up.”

The servodriver almost falls from your grip again. You turn around to bow your head to the Inquisitor. Your eyes are obstinately drawn to the lightsaber resting against his thigh. “Of course, sir.”

The constant feeling of “I hope he doesn’t kill me” in your gut makes your hands shake but somehow you manage to make sure the lock works again. The Inquisitor still leans on the wall, looking like he has all the time in the world to just hang out. You don’t think you’ve ever seen him outside the dojo.

“There. Is it okay if I go in to check the AC now?” You don’t want to look him in the eye and with your every cell hope that he will leave now and let you work in peace.

Not a chance.

He shows you inside and stays hovering nearby as you try to calm yourself enough to work. He can’t seem to take his eyes off you. Something about you, watching you is… itching him.

“The thermostat seems to be broken, sir.” You dare a peek at the Inquisitor. He doesn’t seem as intimidating as the others and is actually younger than you initially thought. “I’ll need to go fetch some parts but I’ll set a static room temperature for now.”

“Okay.” He runs his hand through his ginger hair and sighs. “Can’t you just make a droid bring the parts?”

You blanch. “Uh, yes. Of course, I just thought it’d be faster if… I go… myself…” Your voice trails off under the cryptically meaningful look in his eyes.

Cal examines you, circling around in a slow, lazy arc. He has noticed you before even though you actively make every effort to not stand out. He felt something spark inside him in the hallway and he needs a moment to realize it’s curiosity that brings life to his dull existence. The feeling has some exhilarating new shades and he wonders is it because you look like a cornered animal, shaking in fear.

It excites him.

“Sir?” you squeak and can’t form the follow up question because Cal takes a step towards you.

“Who are you?” he asks slowly, gaze trained onto your face, eyes boring holes into your mind. His pulse is quickened like in the thick of a combat and he cannot understand why.

“Um, I’m not sure I– I’m just a technician. I’ve got clearance, y-you see… I can show you my ID…” you stutter and fumble a hand into your chest pocket to fish out the ID card. “See?”

Cal doesn’t even spare a glance at it.

“Yeah. I’m not interested in that,” he says coolly. He stands close enough to either strangle or hug you – though you know he wouldn’t need to get close and personal to kill you. You’re starting to panic.

“Sorry…” you peep, “Can I…”

Go?

You can’t finish the sentence because the Inquisitor leans forward and plants a gloved hand against the wall over your shoulder – a predator enjoying one last sniff of his prey before the killing blow.

All of your jittering ends and you completely freeze. The whimper that escapes your lips doesn’t sound like you at all. He has so many freckles and the feeling they enact in you acts as the perfect opposite to what their owner is doing. As good-looking as he may be, getting within a kissing distance to the Inquisitor wasn’t on your bucket list.

However, while you’re waiting perfectly still – in spite of your racing heart – for his next move, Cal hesitates. The excitement that spurred him into taking the initiative is gaining an altogether different tone. He is suddenly nervous and has to ball his hand into a fist to stop it from shaking.

You stare at each other, mere inches away and lightly gasp for breaths. The menacing Inquisitor aura is gone and you curse him for toying with you like that since there’s no way you can forget this ever happened. For a fleeting moment, you think should you just kiss him and be done with it – and gamble your life on his goodwill.

Cal finally loses his nerve and leaves without so much as a word or a glance at your direction.

You wait for a few stunned breaths to hear if he is coming back after the fateful sizzle of the door. Your head is positively spinning by the time you make it out alive from the quarters of Inquisitor Cal Kestis.

You hope nothing breaks in his room again.

Part 2

#cal kestis x reader #cal kestis #inquisitor cal kestis #inquisitor cal kestis x reader #jedi fallen order #swjfo #swjfo fanfiction #star wars #my writings #requests

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redrobinhoood · 4 years

Text

In the hands of the enemy | Whumptober2020

“Pick Who Dies” | Collars

TW: None Summary: Anakin is forced to choose between three of the beings he loves.

AO3 Link | Whumptober Index

Rex slowly rolled his head around in a circle, looking to ease some of the strain that the heavy collar left around his neck. It had been hours, how many he didn’t know, but certainly hours. As he finished the roll, he could see Ahsoka on his right scratching the back of her headtails against the metal.

“I thought Anakin would be here by now.” Obi-Wan remarked on Rex’s left. “He sure is taking his sweet time.”

“Well, Rex and I are usually there to keep him on track.” Ahsoka scoffed.

Rex would’ve been worried if he had been alone. But he wasn’t. The room wasn’t dark enough to prevent him from seeing the Jedi in their respective ray shields on each side and their presence brought him comfort. He just didn’t want to be on the other end of the lightsaber when they were freed.

Obi-Wan made a sound as if he was going to respond but fell silent at the sound of approaching footsteps. The door to the warehouse slid open and Anakin and a Phindian walked in. The Phindian flipped on the lights as they entered, and Rex found himself blinking as his eyes adjusted to the light.

“Just as Moralo Eval said.” The Phindian gestured to the prisoners.

“And what do you want from me?” Anakin’s eyes danced across the room in search of traps.

“Just your cooperation. See the collars around their necks? At the touch of this button,” the Phindian waved a remote before him, “they will produce a lethal shock.”

“Tell me why I shouldn’t gut you now.” Anakin growled, resting his hand on his lightsaber hilt.

“Because if I die, they all die.” Eval bared his teeth in what may have been a smile. “But you have a choice, Skywalker. You get the wonderful opportunity to pick the two who survive.”

“You want me to kill someone?” Anakin’s voice rose and his grip on his lightsaber tightened.

“Patience, Skywalker. You must play the game.”

Anakin threw his fist away from his hilt in rage and stepped towards the trio. His eyes scanned across them, coming to stop at Ahsoka. “Let Ahsoka go.” He commanded.

Eval nodded and the lights on Ahsoka’s collar powered off, the ray shield above her falling away. She stood up and stumbled over to Anakin, who stepped forward to steady her and pull her against his side as he turned back to the men.

Rex took a deep breath. Of course Anakin would free Ahsoka- hell, he’d wanted him to free Ahsoka- but Rex knew what would happen next. He hoped that it wouldn’t, but he also knew that he was only a clone. Obi-Wan had practically raised Anakin, he was like a brother to him. Eval had presented Anakin with a choice that never existed.

Anakin’s face contorted into a look of pain. “Let Obi-Wan go.”

Rex’s chest tightened in pain, and maybe a little bit of fear. When Anakin looked to him, Rex nodded to let him know it was okay. Rex had known that he’d be the one to die. He’d already forgiven Anakin for it. He looked over to Ahsoka, frozen in horror at Anakin’s side. He wished that she wasn’t here to see this. Rex knew that he could never protect Ahsoka from the horrors of war, but this was not the war. This was the revenge of a madman.

“Very well.” Eval said.

Rex closed his eyes. He didn’t want to see the looks on his friends faces as he died. Once he had hoped that he would die in battle, in the arms of one of his brothers or his Jedi. He thought for sure that that was to be his fate, to die in combat for the Republic. But this was an execution, not a battle, and he wished now that he could die here alone.

Rex heard the sound of the collar buzzing to life and clenched his jaw. No matter how much it would hurt, Ahsoka could never know. That thought was gone the moment the electricity began to surge through his body. All his thoughts were gone, burned away by the burst of current that flowed through him. He could feel his muscles contracting as the electric fields governing his body went haywire. He might have cried out in pain. If he did, it was lost to him. Then it stopped and dying felt very painful as he slammed into the duracrete floor, his body convulsing. One half of the collar lay before him, broken, and Rex suddenly realized that he was not dead.

There was shouting and a commotion, but he couldn’t process the sounds over the erratic beating of his heart in his ears. However, he did feel the small arms that wrapped around his body and the flesh of the lekku pressing against his head as Ahsoka pulled him into her arms. He wanted to order her to put him down. His muscles still twitched uncontrollably, and he didn’t want his jerking limbs to hurt her. But he couldn’t raise his voice to say it and the touch of skin was better than that of duracrete. So instead he closed his eyes and tried to get his breathing under control. Ahsoka was slowly rubbing a hand up and down his back and he tried to time his breath to the movement.

“Rex?” Ahsoka’s voice shook and he felt her take his wrist into her free hand. She must’ve thought she’d lost him when his eyes closed.

It took all of Rex’s strength to open his eyes again, and more to force the words past his lips. “‘M alright, kid.”

Ahsoka let out a sob of relief and moved her hand down from his wrist to tangle their fingers together. He couldn’t feel her touch but tried to give her hand a reassuring squeeze anyways.

“Rex!” Rex didn’t have to turn around to know that it was Anakin crashing to his knees behind him.

“Gen’ral.” Rex greeted. He was starting to feel tired again.

“Let’s get him back to the ship.” Anakin slipped his arms under Rex, taking him from Ahsoka’s grip. Rex let his head loll against Anakin’s chest as the man stood. He knew that he would be okay. There was a medical droid on the ship, any damage he had sustained from the shock would be treated. But at the same time, Rex thought that he may have rather died. He had been raised knowing that he was an expendable pawn for the Republic, but he’d never thought that he would become an expendable pawn to his general. Though it was silly to think that his life had any value equal to that of a Jedi. Still, for a moment, Rex wished he had died so that he wouldn’t have to live with this knowledge. Then he felt something wet hit his face and blinked open his eyes to find that his general was crying as he carried him.

“Anakin.” Rex rasped.

“Just hang in there, Rex.” He sounded desperate.

“I forgive you.”

Anakin didn’t verbally respond, but Rex felt his general’s grip on his body tighten. Rex closed his eyes again and focused on his still erratic heartbeat. They would talk later. Now, Rex felt safe in the presence of his Jedi.

#captain rex #anakin skywalker #obi-wan kenobi #ahsoka tano #the clone wars #whumptober2020 #no.2 #pick who dies #collars #star wars #fic #my fics

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ironmandeficiency · 4 years

Text

13 x 7 = 28

pairing: no pairing (no reader mentioned)

word count: 1907

summary: naturally is in deep shit. he got in over his head during sabaac with a member of the five-oh-first and now owes the man in blue more credits than he’s ever had at once. luckily, his ori’vod have his back.

a/n: apparently a sequel to “who’s my commander” was something ppl wanted, and i was all too eager to write something with my darling twenty-fifth boys. heads up, this is a dialogue-heavy piece. tagging @boba-thot, & @morganas-pendragons . please ask me abt my oc boys!! i have so many of them, i would love to share them with y’all!!!

“jort! ba! wait up!” the men in question slow down upon hearing their names being frantically shouted. if there was something bad happening that pertained to combat or one of the carnivorous felucian plants, they wouldn’t be the ones sought out. so they realized that it must be something of a personal nature and that allowed their heart rates to slow back down as they turned to identify the vod calling for them.

naturally was in deep shit. he had made the poor decision to join a few members of the five-oh-first in a game of sabaac and now owed them ninety-one credits, which was more than he’s ever had at once. the credits he had now only added up to half of that and knew that if he didn’t think of something, he’d be stuck on sanitation to pay off his debt to the cog-headed man.

jort would not admit that his mood softened a little upon identifying the distressed man as naturally. ba, however, knew that the man beside him was indeed sympathetic (sometimes too much for his own good) and that jort was now planning his evening around the needs of the frantic kih’vod in front of them.

“naturally, what’s wrong?”

“i was playing sabaac with the five-oh-first and got in over my head! i owe jesse more credits than i’ve had since i left kamino and i-“

the rookie was almost trembling and that was it, the older troopers were done for. naturally was now officially under the protection of him and jort, jesse be damned.

a metaphorical lightbulb lit up over jort’s head. ba could see said lightbulb the way he always does when his batchmate has an idea. the lightbulb hasn’t been able to distinguish good ideas from bad ones yet, but there was hope for jort yet.

“ninety-one, you say?”

“yeah, ninety-one credits.”

“well nat’ika, i’ve got just the trick to help you out.”

the youngest was almost too busy preening at the term of endearment to realize that his ori’vod was indeed going to help him. ba helped snap him back to reality as jort found a stick, beginning his lesson in the felucian mud.

ba had to admit that this plan was not only kriffing insane, but extremely world-tilting if executed right. it was jedi-level insanity and he didn’t doubt for a second that his batchmate learned the trick from the general.

after running naturally through the trick two more times, he felt that his training was paying off. ba had made the point of jesse knowing if naturally was lying about the credits he had on him and they both nodded their agreement. the youngest pulled his credits from his pouch and counted out twenty-eight, dropping the rest of them into ba’s hand.

jort takes this as a cue to continue. “now remember, you have to let him work some of it out himself towards the end. if you did it right from the start, he’ll be thinkin’ like you the longer it goes on and he’ll fall right into your trap.” naturally is soaking in the information like a sanitation duty sponge, part of him still reeling from the fact he’s being given such attention by a superior.

“does this trick help you a lot?”

jort smiles at the question. “only when the total i’m weaseling out of is ninety-one.”

ba rolls his eyes and butts in, “you say that as if you don’t try your damndest to make the total ninety-one as much as possible.” jort playfully scoffs at the insinuation as ba turns to naturally and grins like a loth-cat, enjoying the laugh he earns almost a tad too much.

this kid was making him soft.

to be truthful, ba would have taken the rookie under his wing the same as jort was currently doing if given the chance to do so in his own time. they’ve discussed as much with fortune, who led oracle company, about snagging a company transfer for the bright-eyed brother. fortune was on board with the idea because he saw how the newer medic worked, the way vode lost the panic in their eyes while being treated by him. it was a valuable trait to have as a medic and even more valuable to the men who fell under his care.

footsteps were heard around them and jort quickly went to mess up the numbers written in the mud. he didn’t want his information being spread where he didn’t want it, and judging by the look on his vod’ika’s face, the man approaching was indeed jesse.

“you think you can do it?”

“i know i can.”

“good man! find me when you’re done!”

ba and jort departed as jesse neared, and naturally was on his own.

“hey, naturally! you owe me for that game!”

naturally moved a hand to his pouch and made a show of getting every credit out. he let them clink together in the outstretched palm of the man in blue. “here’s twenty-eight credits, i’ll see you later-“

“alright, i- wait just a minute! there were seven rounds, and you bet thirteen each time. that’s way more than a measly twenty-eight!”

“that comes out to twenty-eight, vod.”

jesse’s wondering whether this guy’s tube was cracked. this rookie medic owes him ninety-one credits! on what planet does thirteen times seven equal twenty-eight? “did you get dropped on your head as a cadet?”

naturally suppressed a grin. “not that i can recall.”

“do you mean to tell me that you can prove that thirteen times seven is twenty-eight?”

“it’s gotta be, i owe you twenty-right credits.”

“tell you what: if you can prove it, you can keep the credits. if you can’t, you’ll owe me double.”

naturally stiffens a little at the prospect of having to owe one hundred and eighty-two credits to the cogged man who doesn’t seem to be the type to forget things like this. but he has faith in himself and the trick jort taught him, so he agrees to the deal and grabs the stick from earlier and begins the trick.

“seven into twenty-eight’s gonna come out to thirteen, watch.”

naturally draws a large seven in the dirt, followed by a significantly smaller twenty-eight separated by a slash, then another slash on the other side of the twenty-eight.

“can seven go into two?”

“no it will not.”

“that’s a giant seven to fit into that little bitty two.”

“... yes it is.”

“but we’re not gonna hurt the little two, so i want you to hold onto it for me.”

naturally “grabbed” the two from where he drew it in the dirt and “placed” it into jesse’s outstretched palm. that was simple enough so far, but there was still so much farther he had to go before getting out of this mess.

jesse was going with it only because he wanted his credits. that’s the only reason he was entertaining the bullshit of this rookie medic.

“can seven go into eight?”

“once.”

“right, so i’m gonna put the one over here,” naturally drew a one next to the second slash.

“now we’re gonna carry the seven, because it’s a big seven and it’s getting kinda heavy, and we’re gonna drop it down here below the eight.” as naturally speaks, jesse nods and follows along intently. “and seven from eight is?”

“one.” come on, jesse thought, i’m not that kriffin’ stupid.

“alright, now you’ve had that two long enough, give it here.” naturally holds his hand out for jesse to give him the two, and the older trooper isn’t sure as to why he’s playing into the little game this rookie’s got going but he “drops” the two into his palm nonetheless.

“you see that twenty-one? how many times can seven go into it?”

“three times.”

“so the three goes over here,” naturally continues as he draws a three into the dirt next to the one, “and look at that, thirteen.”

sure enough, there was now a thirteen drawn into the dirt next to the twenty-eight. jesse didn’t completely believe what he was looking at, much less the fact it made sense! he had to get more evidence, surely this wasn’t right.

“nah man, you’ve gotta prove it better than that if you expect me to believe that your math checks out.”

“alright, certainly.”

“you gotta multiply it.”

apparently there was still more to say and write if he wanted to save his head from being mounted on a five-oh-first bunk. thank the maker for jort’s extensive explanation or else naturally would have been screwed.

so he smeared away the numbers with a gloved hand, not bothering to care as to how it dirtied the leather, and continued on.

“let’s see here,” naturally mumbles to himself as he begins to draw in the dirt once again, tongue poking out between his teeth. a thirteen is now in the dirt with a seven below it, with a line under the seven. “okay. so we’ve got thirteen times seven. three times seven is?”

“twenty-one.”

“exactly, so we bring a twenty-one down. now one times seven is…”

“seven.”

naturally hums in agreement as he draws a seven below the one in twenty-one. “now twenty-one plus seven is-“

“twenty-eight.” jesse seems to be contemplating the lesson very hard, putting it side by side with everything he had been taught prior to then. it looked like it made sense, and his brain said it made sense, but to make him feel better he had to check it one more time.

“but now we gotta add it, just to be sure.”

“of course.”

this is where naturally sees if his hard work paid off, if jort’s lessons paid off. if he did his part good enough, then jesse would follow along and this would be easy peasy. most importantly though, he wouldn’t be bucket deep in debt to the trooper next to him.

smearing the mud one last time, he began to give jesse the final piece of the puzzle. “i’m gonna our down seven thirteens and add ‘em from there, alright?”

“alright.”

he puts the numbers down, one above another, and draws a line below the last. taking his stick, he begins to count by threes when the other man cuts him off halfway through. “no no no, let me do it this time!”

jesse starts to count by threes and ends on twenty-one, like he should, but also jort was sure to tell him that if he didn’t take over now that the plan was doomed to fail.

so in an effort to save his plan, naturally began pointing to the ones with his stick as he counted, “twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight!”

he spoke the numbers with confidence as he wrote the twenty-eight into the dirt, turning to give a dignified smirk to the cornflower painted trooper next to him.

jesse looked so lost and had no idea as to why this made a lick of sense, but had to concede that the young medic was right. to answer his earlier question, felucia is a planet where thirteen times seven is twenty-eight.

with a grin naturally collected the credits that had still been clutched in the other’s hand, stepping on the numbers casually enough to not raise suspicion as to why he was stepping on them. he was saved from a terrible fate and got to keep his money; it was a good night for naturally.

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threadsketchier · 5 years

Note

I started to realize that some people try to take Luke's 'jediness' away from him by claiming he doesn't have any cool treats, Leia would be more fit to be a jedi or how he failed at the end as we saw in sequels. But all those characters like Leia and Han have their on thing going on when the series start. She's a senator he's a smuggler Luke doesn't really have much going on for him so if you take away the Jedi what's he left with

That’s a really good point - each of the characters have their roles, and while it’s fun to craft AUs in which those roles get swapped around, that doesn’t mean it’s because any of them were lacking in canon. Tit for tat - it would be an equal disservice to Leia to say that she should have been a Jedi instead to the exclusion of her being a princess/senator/Rebel leader, as if that wasn’t good enough for her, or that she’s better than her brother.

Jedi are cool, but they’re not the ONLY cool kids on the block.

However...Luke had a great deal of positive traits way before he actually became a Jedi, and we shouldn’t discount them by assuming that his identity as a Jedi is the be-all, end-all of him either. Being raised by humble moisture farmers instilled a deep sense of morality, perseverance, and compassion into him. He had no significant powers to help him rescue Leia in ANH, just his own mortal wits. His greatest strengths then were that he cared and he was a smart cookie with thinking on his feet. Even when we see him again in ESB, yeah, he uses the Force to get out of dodge in the wampa’s lair - but he used nothing but his intelligence and insane bravery to hatch a plan against the Imperial walkers involving the snowspeeders’ tow cables, and then fucking took one out by himself when he got shot down.

Yes, Luke is the son of the Chosen One, the grandson of the Force, but he’s a package deal too. If he had no powers and no destiny as a Jedi, but he was otherwise exactly the same, he’d be just as valuable and effective, just as much a hero, as other characters like Lando, Chewie, and Wedge. He could have still been a good pilot, likely still a military leader in some capacity, and without the burden of having to reestablish the entire Jedi Order after the war, there’s a whole galaxy of possibilities that would’ve been open to him.

#my meta #star wars #luke skywalker #is still a pretty cool guy without the force #disney star wars

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popculturebuffet · 4 years

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Top 10 Regular Show Episodes

Close Enough is Close! 2 more days and a show i’ve waited without hyperbole years for will finally land offically. While i’ve seen three episodes preelease, one because of a french film festival the other two because HBO made an oopsie, and it’s more than likely i’ll be seeing those episodes again thursday, it dosen’t make it any less special, as with an offical release comes the fandom finally becoming a thing and the ablility to watch the episodes over and over again.. on computer till HBO gets it’s shit together but still. IT’s a great time. And my hype for the show made me revisit it’s big brother: Regular Show. Created by what would happen if you condesned california into a person, JG Quintel, Regular Show, as you all damn well know but I like doing anyway so as rigby would say, STOP TALKING, was about two slackers and best bros: Laidback hipster and hurricane when it came to talking to women, Mordecai and Rigby a high strung, idiotic, impulsive, and frequently angry racoon who worked, when they absolutley had to, at a park. Joining them at the park were their coworkers and later closest friends: Benson, their constnatly angry boss who constnatly belts out empty threats to fire them and has a rather sad personal life, Skips, a centuries old yeti whose literally seen it all and despenses advice for the duo and is voiced by everyone’s faviorite grandpa/jedi/murder clown Mark Hamill, Muscle Man, a grotesque blob of a man who likes “My mom” jokes and breaking things, Hi Five Ghost, Muscle Man’s sidekick who got like.. one episode focusing on him alone over 8 seasons moving on, and Pops, an odd but unfailingly sweet and kind vicotrian era gentleman whose also basically immortal and is Bensons’ boss in name only. The Park Crew spend their days working, or in our main duo’s case trying to get out of work to do anything else, while dealing with every day issues that would quickly ballon into insanity. Getting pops a birthday present of Fuzzy Dice from a local pizza place ended up with the crew having to fight a bunch of anamatonic animals that were stashing diamonds in there. Trying to get concert tickets involved getting caffine from the nipples of a giant sentient coffee bean in order to stay awake long enough to do the extra work. And Mordecai trying to delete an embrarassing message off his crush Margret’s voice mail lead to him and rigby getting hauled in front of a bunch of a message guardians, one of which is a sentient smoke signal that wanted to burn them while the other replied with “we’ree not going to burn them when have we ever burned anybody”... I love and miss those guys. Oh and it’s resolved by having to playt he embarassing song he sang while said message beings groove to it then ask him to colaberate with them on their album. THis show was on all the drugs and I am all the hear for it. I could go all day obviously but this section is long enough as is, let’s move on.

Regular Show came at JUST the right time for Cartoon Netowork: Similar to how the 80s doom patrol comic started off really bland and cookie cutter and not at all doom patrol and then grant morrison came in, had hte previous writer kill almost everything, then rebuilt it from scratch with crazy, CN had few shows left and was coming off a really terrible attempt at competeing with NIck and Disney Channel’s live action dommance with a bunch of dude broy reality shows and other ill conceved ideas. The network had a few shows, Total Drama, The Clone Wars which got better and I need to watch those better seasons at some point, but they weren’t enough to make the network thrive again. SO enter adventure time and regular show: BOth were creative, funny , a bit rough around the ages, and kind of nuts, but both were massive hits: The shows hit almost every demographics sweet spots: Kids like the bright colors, fun designs, and insanity, teens loved the edgy bits of the humor and also the insanity and 20 somethings and older both found refrences they got and loved, and well.. insanity. I mean being fucking nuts but also wonderful is kind of the watchword for most animation nowadays. While in the past in my own head i’ve played down Regular Show’s part in things, after all it came second and had a rough patch I told myself.. but I was wrong. Both shows had a lot of the same elements; insane stuff, great voice acting and good humor especially as they evolved.. but both also evolved in largely the same way and that way helped change animation for the next decade: Both, despite being comeidies, regular show keeping to it a bit more than adventure time did as they evolved, had the characters grow, something a lot of animated comedies didn’t do as much ast the time, even the good ones. THey had season long arcs, things that are now standard features in most cartoons for good reason were MADE standard by these shows. It’s just regular show’s legacy got diluted by shows that TRIED to copy it but both failed to see that it grew past season one or that it’s being okay for kids but really based in adult life and problems meant copycats like fanboy and chum chum, sanjay and craig and breadwinners, all thankfully long dead, eventually sputtered out and died. That and Nick is REALLY shitty at maintaing shows or treating creators with anything resembling respect. Somehow Teen Titans Go is still alive despite having similar failings but you can’t win everything. It didn’t help gravity falls came along right after and proceded to be even more influentail than both of these shows. Hmmm I just realized I haven’t done any gravity falls reviews here.. I gotta get on that. But while the show got eclipsed in quality and popularity I do still think it holds up for the most part as funny, charming and with , for the most part, good character arcs, it’s just that a bit of incosntientcy, some abrubtly done actions and a REALLY fucking terrible arc in season 6 dull the show a bit in comparison to what came after, but I do realize now it’s still worht watching, remembering and laughing at. It may of not been the greatest, but damn it was good. So with my nostaliga for the show popping up, my faith in it restored, and it’s sucessor showing up in a few days, I decided to do a little something for the ocassion. I WAS going to do a full on review, but had troulbe finding an episode as some of my faviorites are part of a larger arc that was hurt by a later arc, and the show ping ponged between slice of life and utter insanity enought hat it was hard to peg down to jus tone or two episodes. So while I WILL review the show eventually, it has both good and bad episodes needing it, I decided instead to dig out something I hadn’t done in far too long: a top whatver lists! Now while I do get these things are clickbaity, because they are, I.. honestly just love making them. Even if i’ts not for any specific purpose I just love ranking, the stress, even if I normally hate stress given my anxiety, of trying to narrow them down, and the satisfaction of taking a ton of episodes and melting htem down into the best of them. And with a show as long and varied as regular show, If igured this was the best way to show it off before I dived into it eventually. I’ll obviously be doing more top, and bottom lists in the future, but for now this seemd like a godo place to get back to it. As Now a few more things before we finally get started. Yes I know i’ve gone on for a few years now but i’m almost done. This list is obviously, my opinon. If you disagree fine, and feel free to comment or shoot me an ask about it but I stand by my list and what I choose. I had to boil down over 60 episodes I picked to possibly be on the list and even after it was down to 40 cuts were really difficult, .. Also just as a quick note there are no episodes from seasons 1, 6, 7 and 8, and that’s not on purpose, as the last two seasons are really good, it just fell out that way and i’m sorry about it. So with that out of the way grabs some sodas and wings, get out your maxi gloves, and bring out your best sentient earworms wearing sunglassses, after the cut I count down the top 10 Regular Show episodes. OOOOOOOOO!

10. I Like You, Hi (Season 5, Episode 26) As you’ll be able to tell by the rest of this list Season 5 is my faviorite, and it’s where I feel the series hit it’s peak before next season lead to it’s valley. It’s got a ton of great episodes, as this list will attest, some great character development, and was still really damn funny. But what put it over the top for me was the Mordecai and CJ arc. At the end of the last season as you probably know the show wrote out Margret, having her finally get into college like she’d wanted since she got an actual character back in “Camping Be Cool” instead of just being “that hot girl mordecai really likes but is too scared to persue”, and another fantastic episode we’ll be getting to, Mordecai was in position to move on. Re-Enter CJ. CJ was introduced earlier in the season 3 ep “Yes Dude Yes” which itself is really good, where Mordecai thought margret was engaged and with Rigby’s encouragment, ended up meeting CJ, stands for Cloudy Jay if your curious, a sentient cloud voiced by the wonderful LInda Cardenelli, aka wendy from gravity falls and currently co star of the equally wonderful show Dead to Me. Seriously go check it out on netflix, it’s really good. It naturally went pearshaped since Margret wasn’t engaged, he tried going out with both, she turned into a thunderstorm out of rage... as you do.. it’s like the season 6 plot but less infurating and more understandable. But the two remeet, and had a kiss on new years while not knowing it’s the other person under am ask.. and then CJ ran and both thought the other was upset: MOrdecai for him being MOrdecai, and CJ for running out on him and agreed to be friends. That didn’t last, though it did give us another classic on this list, as while exes can be friends and all, the two still had something between them. Thus came this one. And it was a hard one as it barely inched out the finale of their relationship arc, Real Date, which had the ceo of a dating company try to break them up and be really damny funny but it’s ulitmatley this one being just as hilarious while being a great character piece that gets it the rub. As the episode opens Mordecai and CJ have been spending a LOT of time together and i’ts clear there’s a spark there.. but Mordecai insists it’s platonic. And yes there is a bad habit of animation being unable to accept females and males who are into the oppistie sex can’t be friends without being attracted to each other. It’s being cleared up more lately, but as Star Vs showed it still happens sometimes. But it works here: The two STARTED with dating, made out on new years, and are attracted to each other it’s just clear both were in denial about it. It’s not saying “well they have chemstiry so fuck their partners’ like star vs or “if you loved someone once those feelings will return and destroy yoru current relationship” like next season.... season 6′s arc is a tirefire burn it. But the issue is forced when, while texting about an extreme baking show together while CJ’s at her job at a sports bar, it autocrrects from Yuji, the show’s host, to you hi, sending the title message “I like you, hi”. Mordecai, being even less adept with his feelings and anxiety towards women than me and trust me that’s saying something, spirals and we do get the episodes best scene, narrowly beating out it’s climax, where Mordecai summons a war council.. aka the rest of the main cast minus benson but plus Thomas, the intern who I wish stuck around longer even after he turned out to be a russian spy because they ran out of ideas for him, voiced by Roger Craig Smith and distractingly using his future sonic voice.

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I just.. love everything about the scnee. From the term pulling a mordecai, to Rigby joining in, deservedly as he’s had front row seats for a lot of this bollocks, to everyone’s suggestions especially Muscle Man’s half assed one that somehow, but unsuprisngly, works for him and Starla. Naturally Mordecai comes up with what Rigby HIMSELF admits is a Rigby level half assed scheme to get an actual photo with Yuji rather than just admit the truth. Yuji himself is an utter delight, having had his star not rise as fast as he’d like thanks to autocorrect and being entirely on board, and when it backfires as MOrdecai ends up autocorrected and sends the message thrice and gets sucked into the phone again, admits i’ts “pretty extreme’. I love the guy and i’m prety sure he showed up again, to my delight.

In the phone Mordecai meets some old friends, the message guardians who I mentioned in the “insane shit this show has done” bit earlier: old forms of messaging who police texting, all voiced by Rich Fulcher of the Mighty Boosh and Snuffbox Fame.

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I love Rich and wish these guys could show up in close enough. Maybe they can, I don’t know how rights issues with turner properties work when it comes to two diffrent audiences entirely. Anyways what really makes the episode, besides the great callbacks in this scene, is when confronted with everything going on, Mordecai.. tries to run into the void, with Rigby, The Message Recorder and the Smoke Signal all encouraging him to come back. “There’s nothing out there for you, literally it’s just a blank void”. With the leading tape recorder pointing out from their text history not only how great CJ is but how much he seems to like her with Mordecai finally coming back and admitting the obvious: He does like her.. he’s just scared of beefing it again. Which he does but that’s not the point. Rigby, who as part of his character development helps Mordecai quite a bit with this stuff by being a neutral party, though he also likes CJ better than Margret which is a mood even though I don’t care which one you ship mordecai with frankly, you do you, I have my prefrences. And with that Mordecai finally texts her and asks her out, with her accepting via winky face.. with an added text to clarify it for his neuotic ass.. which is also a mood as my neuortic ass could use that a lot. Overall just a wonderful , hilarious and good bit of character growth.. that season 6 throws in the oven, but that’s a long rant for another day. On it’s own, “I LIke you, hi” is a good character piece for mordecai whlie still being really damn funny.

9. Thanksgiving Special (Season 5, Episode 15)

Regular Show was really damn great at holliday specials. Their terror tales from the park every halloween were always a nice treat and a good replacement for Simpsons “Treehouse of Horror” which still exists, it’s just no one cares at this point, and their christmas and new years episodes are both really damn good, the first Christmas Episode being in contention for this list even. But to me the best of the best was easily Season 5′s thanksgiving episode.

The premise is simple: Mordecai and Rigby accidnetly destroy thanksgiving dinner, which the park crew is having for everyone and their famllies and, refusing to take Benson trying to dismiss their attempts to help fix their mistake, end up joining a songwriting contest to try and win a Turducken.. a natural one that’s born every 1000 Years because this is regular show. To do this they have to beat a parody of everyone’s least faviorite president Donald Trump, Rich Buckner. The fact that trump was basically the main villian of a holliday special a year before he became president is not lost on me and is one of the most accurate depections of the man i’ve ever seen. The fact Rich steals the prize despite our boys winning from his blimp with a grappling hook is peak trump. The fact Trump has’nt stolen more things with a grappling hook in real life is only because his hands are too small to use one.

Getting past our president for my own sanity, the episode also has really great subplots: Muscle Man and Fives go to a sports bar to get sides and end up pissing off a former football player and getting into a touchdown dance comppetition, sadly not set to the super bowl shuffle, while Benson, Pops and Skips go to get a turkey and end up fighting over it with men dressed up like a piligrim, a first thanksgiving era native american and a turkey, to which they don’t even really give an explination for.. granted most explinatoins on this show are insane but even by regular show standards, this gets none. And I love it for it. While as you can tell the episode is really damn funny, what really sells it is the emotional core: For once while they do fear for their jobs a bit Mordecai and Rigby’s main motivation in this messup is genuine guilt and wanting to fix their mistake, and they work hard at it, even giving a genuine and awesome heartfelt song that notches itself up with other thanksgiving classics “That thankstiginv themed soul sketch on snl” and adam sandler’s turkey song also from snl. Not a high bar but it’s really good regardless

The episodes’ real strength though is it’s emotional core: For once instead of saving their own asses or understadnably wanting to get one over on the cranky and in the worse written episodes obnoxiously overbearing benson, they simply feel terrible about possibly runing the meal for their arriving parents and everyone elses parents and families and their friends and work to right the wrong. It’s not the first time they worked to do something genuinely good with no benefit to themselves, but it’s probably the best and Benson’s I forgive you, while hilarious is also really sweet. And speaking of sweet

It ends on a really sweet and touching note, as Mordecai and Rigby, after escaping a blimp via a wish on a golden wishbone because of course, make it home to find the various weirdos the park crew met have brought them thanksgiving, and their parents will be there and we get a nice touching ending as the main duo get a well earned toast from Benson. Just an out and out amazing thanksgiving special and a good reminder of what the holiday means.

8. Trucker Hall of Fame (Season 3, Episode 37)

Moving on from Season 5 for a second, Season 3 was where the show really started to hit it’s stride to me. While Season 2 was a nice increase in quality from the sometimes choppy and heavy on “everyone is an asshole” comedy season 1, Season 3 was where the increased focus on the rest of the cast outside of our main duo balloned and what seeds of character were planted in season 2 beautifully bloomed. And this episode is one of the best examples of that. This one focuses on Muscle Man, who earlier on was basically the main duo’s rival alongside his buddy high five ghost, and kind of a dick. While “Kind of a dick” never left any discription of Mitch Sorenstein, this and previous episode muscle woman showed there was more to the goblin man than we thought. It’s also one of regular show’s few early mostly serious episodes and unlike the benson ones, again this list was tough don’t come at me with a machete, and realy showed why muscle man is the human tire fire he is. The episode introduces, and quickly kills off, muscle dad, mitch’s dad who gave him a love of pranks and was a truck driver who died as he live: mistaking a fake bear for a real one during a prank. Muscle Man being not the most stable person on a GOOD day, spirals, as seen above, and Benson tasks mordecai and rigby, since Fives isn’t good with death ironically and isn’t holding up much better, and as a much later episode shows the two became besties in high school so he probably knew muscle dad for a good ten years so he’s probably not in a great place either, nice stuff, to go with him to put his dad’s ashes in the trucker hall of fame. What follows is a sweet and damn sad episode. While Mitch’s frequent breakkdowns can be hilarous their also really sad and having lost my grandpa since this episode aired, I can relate to being fine one minute and a total shrieking wreck the next over the smallest thing. But it also shows that Mitch genuinely thinks of our main duo as his friends, and that beneath his testorrone positned exterior he’s a decent guy, being genuinely greatful. Of course being regular show the 3 end up squaring off with some truckers, while Mitch also grappels with the revelation his dad wasn’t one but a forklift opperator who faked being a trucker for his son’s benifit and dleft a tender note in his picture, figuring correctly his son would break it open when he found out... oh and because this show is still nuts his ghost ends up saving them at the end which is really sweet , as mitch decides trucker or no his ashes deserve to be there. Also his ghost shows up again at thanksgiving so apparently he can just come back once in a while, which is nice but dosen’t demnish the bittersweet feeling of this ep. And as I said the show has a good grasp on continuity as this ep marked a turning point for our main duo and muscle man: while the’yve bonded before after this, aside from mitch’s habit of christmas pranks and his faking his death, they really don’t nearly get as annoyed by him ever again. i’ts a sweet touching ride tha’ts uncharacristic of the show’s usual chaos but really works.

7. A Bunch of Full Grown Geese (Season 4, Episode 19) After a few episodes that were more sentimental on this list, it’s good to get back to some good old regular show madness for this one, which was also the series 100th in production order and is a worthy milestone episode. Season 4 was really good building on the good will from Season 3 and FINALLY having payoff to the margret and mordecai thing, more on that in a bit. Not as much to say as seasons 3 or 5, but it was still spectacular. The sequel to another ep, fittingly given it’s #100, full grown geese has our duo tasked with removing a bunch of obnoxious geese, with Benson in dick mode refusing to give the two more help, though it does lead to one of the show’s best scenes when he gives his usual your fried threat.. and fitting a milestone episode, Rigby calls him on never going through with it and the threat being as empty as my dreams. Benson responds by going nuts and angrishing them out of his office.. really funny. But yeah with the geese attacking them and , in their first attacking, poor pops, and no way to combat them, the two turn to the baby ducks, a bunch of baby ducks from the episode titled that who show up to help.. and this being the 100th episode of an already grant morrison level nuts show, it turns out the geese seek to conquer earth, voiced by david warner of course and have laser eyes.. and can combine. And the ducks do so again, mecha style, and add in our heroes and a bunch of call backs in one of the series best and most batshit sequences> The ending is also throughly satisfying as while our heroes win, Benson chews them out for tearing up the park in the process.. only for the ducks mom to call him out for not only yelling at the ducks, who are just kids, but at mordecai and rigby after they just saved the park from being a smoldering crater and not just trashed and he backs off. Just a fun episode where the crew just went nuts and the results speak for themselves.

6. This is My Jam (Season 2, Episode 13)

Now this one I couldn’t NOT include. This is one of the series best even after it’s immense growth, and a beloved classic for a reason. And like the above it’s a good classic case of regular show hyjinks while also being relatable this time: Rigby gets a brainless but catchy pop song from the 90′s stuck in his head and despite growing to hate it, and Mordecai hating it because this episode establishes him as a hipster, and seemingly exercises it.. only for it to manifest as a GIANT CASETTE WEARING SUNGLASSES THAT PLAYS THE SONG JUST BY EXISTING AND DANCES CONSTANTLY. it’s utterly glorious and used to great effect, also annoying benson because he’s constnatly annoyed. To beat it the main duo get the rest of the park’s help at Skips suggestion to form a band and craft an even BIGGER earworm to cast it out. Oh and there’s a great scene where Pops is forced to awkwardly dance with the incarnation of the 90′s “But I won’t use my best moves”. The climax also has one of Benson’s best moments as, after he’s irritated all episode, he comes in hot, with both the cast and audience expecting him to chew out mordecai and rigby.. only he’s mad because they forgot drums are key to an earworm and saves the day with his drumwork. It’s a great subversion and one of the first times Benson was more than just the angry but understandable, at times, dickhead boss. Just an utter standout and one of the show’s most memorable episodes for a reason. Also the line “you can’t touch music but music can touch you’ is great.

5. Meteor Moves ( Season 4, Episode 28)

This one was a long time coming and to me is a great example of writers taking their own shortcomings and making something awesome out of them. I prefer that: instead of just retconning away bad writing use it as a tool.. I try to do that myself when possible. See early in the show as you all probably know, Mordecai’s crush on Margret was just a plot device: he had a crush on the cute waitress at the coffee shop so they used it to get him to do things. A gratioutis shot of her in bike shorts got him to bet all computer rights for life that sort of thing. The show.. wasn’t great with female characters till season 3 and even as it grew, as season 6 and just.. forgetting to give CJ a proper ending as a character shows, still grappled with it. It took writer Kat Morris saying “no no stop go to jail” to them wanting ot make CJ a difficult woman type, whatever horrifying thing that is. I don’t want to know, let’s move on. The point is it wasn’t till season 3 that Margret and her best friends, and Rigby’s future wife, Eileen got fleshed out a bit: Eileen got smarter and turned out to be good at wilderness stuff while Margret was chill, nice, if annoyed by the chaos around mordecai, and funloving, while also having a clear goal in stark contrast to her future boyfriend: going to college. Even after coming back it was botha fter finsihing college and to start a career. It wasn’t incredibly deep, but it made me not be ehhh to her mere existance like before. The show also started developing her and Mordecai’s relationship seriously with the two bonding and the previously shown Butt Dial showing for the first time, after previously having a terrible taste in men and then just not noticing his crush, that she was receptive to how mordecai felt. And the two had several moments and two dates even, it just.. never went anywhere for some reason.

And this was INFURATING to me: See back then shows had a tendency to just pop in love intrests SOLEY for plot fuel like margret with no intention of following through with things either through rejection or a relationsihp upgrade and by then I was sick of it. The whole spike and rarity thing in MLP (which to be clear I wanted her to just reject him but nope, even after I stopped watching she never did. ), Isabella and Phineas. I was fed up so I went from being “eh” about it to annoyed supremely.. but the thing is the writers realized this.. and course corrected. The first step was picking up Margret, where Mordecai agrees to pick her up to get her to the airport for a college interview and we get a nice deconstruction of things as Margret is anticpatiing things going wrong, and wrongly blames Mordecai for it.. I mean it is his fault sometimes but half the time weird shit just follows him. However she’s won over by him working past it, getting her there in time and kisses him. That blew me away and made me think well it’s finally here.. and it was.. ALMOST. However the creators wisely, if frustratingly to past me, took one more episode to iron it out: Metor Moves has the two growing closer, and semi-going out, but Rigby pops mordecai’s bubble pointing out he never actually made a boyfriend girlfriend move and her move could’ve gone either way. So Mordecai , after seasons of being wishy washy and awkward, finally decides to go for it as he, rigby, eileen and margret go to a metor shower. Being Regular Show it dosen’t go as planned as his attempted kiss is blocked by the guardians of the friend zone.. which is a real, phantom zone esque place here and that’s just fantastic. And it’s also clearly mocking the hell out of the concept, which is dumb. if you want to ask someone out just do it, I learned that the hard way. And if you really are friends, if she says no then you’ll accept it and keep a friend anyway as I have. But it’s clearly parodying it and Mordecai get sreplayed all the times he ALMOST made a move but didn’t but refuses to accept this clusterfuck, realizes he was a screwup when it came to this.. and kisses her.. and this time the two enter a relationship> Granted it barely lasted but still, it was nice while it did and this ep is just great for it. While not the funniest, it’s up this high because it took somethign the show did wrong.. and turned it on it’s head and into a character flaw and had mordecai grow past it, with a genuinely romantic moment on top as well as an utterly funny and batshit concept. It also had some Rigleen, as by this point rigby stopped being a hateful wastebasket to her and warmed up to her, and I regret there’s no reigleen episodes on this list. Their the shows best couple and utterly adorable. Just wanted to mention that at least once this list.

4. Laundry Woes (Season 5, Episode 1) From the begining to the end. While sadly Morderet didn’t last too long in canon, which blows, it did give us some great episodes while it lasted, as with the above entry and their breakup in Steak Me Amedeus. As mentioned before Margret left for college, which while abrupt feeling did pave the way for great stories: The Mordejay arc mentioned above and that will pop up again very soon, This was one of them: the ep while lacking on laughs is a good emotional rollercoaster and starts with an amazing montage that catches us up from the end of season 4: Mordecai is miserable, as you’d expect and wallowing in it with Benson, of all people, letting him. And given Benson seems to have a heart attack any time Mordecai and Rigby aren’t working, that’s huge. But eventually his friends refuse to let it go on and in a really touching montage help him through it, taking him out places, giving him good times and eventually.. the fog starts to lift and he starts to enjoy himself and by the end.. he’s himself again. It’s one of the series best sequences, told with no dialouge and showing just how far the rest of the cast had come: Benson actually wants to comfort mordecai but is encouraged not to at first, underfstandably as it probably woudlnt’ help, and a crew that were once, aside from Pops who much like Krillin is everyone’s friend, just coworkers who barely tolerated each other, and are now close as family and help their own in need. But Grief isn’t a straight line and just as Mordecai’s recovering he’s sent spiraling when he finds Margret’s sweater and uses ita s a flimsy excuse to go return it. It’s here I also get to talk about Rigby, who grew from an impatient idiot who hated Mordecai’s romantic endevors and actively sabtoaged them at times, to an understandting wing man who, while understandably frustrated with his best friend’s own idiocy with women, turned out to know more and be the wise council he needed, triggering both is relationships and only bailing out during the season 6 clusterfuck and even then was there to comfort him after it was all over and go to his aid to pull him out of another misery hole. And here he gives Mordecai the hard truth: He shoudln’t do this, it’s just going to tear both him and margret up again and he just put himself back together. He’s not going to let his best friend do this to himself. And while there is a supernatural elment, the sweater comes to life and tries to get Mordecai to force margret back with him and give up college, likely voicing his darkest wants that he hates himself for wanting, but it feels more like a manfiestation of Mordecai’s own issues than the usual madness. Like “Trucker hall of Fame”, a rare senntence, it’s a less funny packed more grounded episode. And in the end it’s mordecai himself, after rejecting the ghost sweater and seeing his ex truly happy , that gets him to NOT talk to her and just.. let it go. IT’s a good emotional episode and SHOULD HAVE BEEN the end of their relationship... but i’ve ranted about the cheating storyarc enough here, moving right along.

3. Portable Toilet (Season 5, Episode 16) Back to the Mordejay arc. And yes this arc is my faviorite and while I didn’t make it clear at the time I really shipped the two, even before it became canon. I had nothing against morderet, these two simply had more chemistry and these episodes built CJ up as more of a character than Margret was at the time. It’s why that later arc sucks so much to me: it destroys a perfectly good relationship and story arc for dumb reasons and never really did enough with it to justify doing so. I’ll get to it some day, or if someone comissions it soone rthan some day, but as you can tell i’m still sore over it and great eps like this are part of the reason why. It’s the same reason i’m sore on how Tom was handled on star vs. But as you can also tell as bitter and lemon scented as I am.. these eps are still objectivley great and thus took up a third of the list basically. Case in point Portable Toilet, which zooms back a bit to when neither would admit they were into each other but were now friends at least. Also Eileen was CJ”s friend now because plot convience. I mean they worked, and it bothers me a lot that the creators claim cj washed her hands of her even though she’s not the one who made out with margret... which come to think of it adding her to rigleen.. not a bad idea. I mean Rigby didn’t really like margret true, but they did almost go out before mordecai killed him and then reset time because Mordecai’s always kinda sucked. I’ll file that away for later. But my new OTP aside, I did like the two bonding and what not. Anyways with their outside park friend/RIgby’s future girlfriend now friends with Mordeai’s future girlfriend the four have apparently been hanging out which, while i’ve bemoaned off screen stuff at times, works here and regular show uses it better than most shows. While Rigby can clearly see Mordecai and CJ are into each other Mordecai is as we covered in denial and while that dosen’t really progress here, it does lead to one of teh shows finest hours. When talking would you rathers, CJ semi-flirtly dares Mordecai to eat his lunch sandwitch in a portable toilet, which he agrees to and drags a reluctant rigby along for. This being regular show, it goes south fast as the two get stuck, with Rigby’s clautrophiba kicking in leading to an amazing exchange Mordecai; Dude that makes no sense! Rigby: You’s makes no sense! While our dynamic duo try to get mordecai and rigby out the two are carted away and repalced with a new portable toilet, a deluxe one. Also we get another great bit when our dynamic duo find Muscle man, in a robe with choclate’s claming “Eileen, other girl, this isn’t weird” before screaming “This isn’t weird”. Turns out old portable toilets are taken to be blown up by the miltary and we get one of the shows best one off characters in the general, who not only explains it as “toilets being about the same size as the enmy” but when told he should call the president says “the preseident is not my father i’ll blow up as many toilets as I want.”. Spectacular. So now it’s a scramble for one twosome to rescue the other, Rigby lets out a cathartic “THANK YOUUU MORDECAI” over the flirty toilet dare, and the day is saved> This one is another pure comedy one, even if it ties into a plot I really like, and i’ts gold for obvious reasons and manages to take blowing up porta poties, a premise that dosen’t seem that funny, and make it utter comedic gold. Speaking of pure comic episodes that are utterly insane...

2. Cool Bikes (Season 3, Episode 7)

This one feels like regular show boiled down to it’s core: semi-relabtale hyjinks dovetalling into pure madness. And the premise sounds like a shit post i’d make: Mordecai and Rigby want benson to admit their cool and get into progressively weird outfits and tricks to their bycycles to do so, eventually becoming so cool their put on trial by the council of cool , ending up having to make a runner when Benson finally breaks down and admits it. The premise is utterly stupid in the best way possible, with the conflict being the kind of petty bullshit we all get into from time to time with our aquantinces: not wanting to admit something and loose the argument withthings escalating. And in regular show terms it escalate sperfectly into the entire unvierse being threatned adn our heros being on trial for their lives. There’s not much to say here, it’s just pure comedic gold with a premise that just works. It also has good moments for Benson with his finally admitting they are cool and saving the duo’s lives whne he realized he just gave them a death sentence. Utter fun. And now we come to the finale, my faviorite episode...

1. Dodge This (Season 5, Episode 15)

Yup this arc again. But this one has more than my ship going for it, and it’s why it soared to the top: It takes the excellent character work of other episodes and weaves it with excellent comedy to create an utter delight and the episode I remember most fondly and most often. It’s just great. The second part of the Mordeijay arc, not counting yes dude yes, the episode is half that and half sports movie: The Park Guys have been taking part in dodgeball as a team bulding thing and it shows how far Benson’s come as he not only praises mordecai, and launches the mordecai and benson ship in the process, but gives his team full wings and his full support, a far cry from his usual self. It’s also the first big instance of him getting hammered on wings and it’s glorious to see drunk flirty benson. Benson is also genuinely congratulatory to the team’s ace mordecai, and most of them realy for b eing valuable and hopes to win this year. IN their way are two things: The magical elements, aka the floating baby heads that gave skips his immortality, his friend with sparkly eyes who works for them and death himself whose a recurring character and fucking great and who were their bowling rivals too. The other is CJ is back, and Benson in another good moment actually talks mordecai through it and his nerves over it assuring him. So we get a great sports piece as our heroes work through various callbacks and even beat the magical elements iwth Rigby’s hilarious and rediculous rignado manuver, which is as dumb as it sounds and winged a guy hilaroiusly before with Benson scolding him like a toddler. Of course it ends up with Mordecai and CJ against each other, both incredibly awkard over things as mentioned before, and both ending up in a stalmate that magical dodgeball guardians have to resolve because, let’s do this one last time. IT’S REGULAR SHOW. We do get a good moment though as the two work through their awkwardness: both thinking the other is rightfully mad: Mordecai for his two timer date with her and Margret and CJ for running out without talking to mordecai after they had a moment on new years. The both work past it, the park strikers loose,benson likely gets hammered again off screen.. it’s a good one and I have no shame in putting it at number one. It’s got heart, really great jokes, and some good charcter stuff, not to the level of other episodes on this list, but it wasn’t a full episode of that like those were and still works to move the plot forward and is still a classic. Just a fun, breezy, well done epsidoe fully rooted in the cast’s characters and getting laughs out of that.. mostly benson. And with that this giangantic list comes to a close> I hope you enjoyed it, if you liked it follow me for more. I’ll be doing close enough coverage every week, as well as amphibia and owl house among other reviews. Until we meet again, later days.

#regular show #mordecai #rigby #cj #eileen #margret #muscle man #benson dunwoody #high five ghost #pops mallerd #skips #death #yuji #rich fulcher #close enough #top 10 lists #cartoon network

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fleeting-sanity · 5 years

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Ever since she was out from that state between life and death, Vaylin felt a festering difference within her. Personally she didn't like it, but it made her feel so much better. Like a weight being gradually lifted off, her feet taking its steps as if she was slightly floating. Yet she's still denying of how good it felt.

And his presence around her was starting to feel like a swaying breeze on a fair day.

She broke the silence by bringing out a holoprojector, turning it on to news coverage of Rionnic's recorded coronation on every channel. She groaned, but then saw a glimpse of Arcann in the background navigating the crowd while holding a girl's hand. Disbelief mixed with amusement was clearly seen on her face. "Arcann has a girlfriend??"

"Is that the girl with the black hair and um, short height?" Riornivo asked.

"Yeah?"

"Ahh! So they did get together after all."

"Are you serious?? Someone wanted Arcann?" the next second had Vaylin bursting into laughter. Rio was quite surprised by that, but happy for her. Happy for Arcann too. "Is that weird, if I may know?"

She gulped to stop laughing at the joke that was Arcann being romantically involved with someone. "Weird is an understatement. I can't believe he actually thought about having a girlfriend. I could see Thexan having one but Arcann? He's... not very smart."

The last part of her statement was amplified by his less than stellar decision to have the Knights duel each other, thus cutting their numbers severely. There were other decisions and younger moments where Arcann brandished his recklessness making her wish she had Thexan as the surviving brother instead. This led her to think of how potentially unsafe for that girl to enter a relationship with Arcann. What's stopping her from suffering Thexan's fate? But away with that, she cared not of whatever happens to a stranger.

"Did Thexan ever have one?"

"Unsure. The years after I was out of Nathema he didn't have one, perhaps before that but I doubt it."

"I wish I could have met Thexan. He seemed quite interesting," stated the Jedi, steering the conversation as the mood eased into a relaxed one. He intentionally left out the part of his knowledge of the late Prince during his conquest.

"Everyone knew he was better than his twin. Of course Arcann wasn't happy with that. I know I wouldn't be..."

Seeing Vaylin relating with Arcann's struggles made Rio believe in her growth, although it's too soon to tell. "I think he's doing so much better now. He doesn't worry about that anymore."

"He's worrying about his safety. Dragging that girl into the dangers of his reputation. Not that I care."

"That's common knowledge... she knew the risks of loving him. Personally, I think he deserves the love he's receiving now and this new chance at life. The dangers, public hatred, and differences will be their own hardships. If they can best that, they'll come out better for it." mused the Jedi Outlander.

Vaylin scoffed, taking his ramblings a little easier now. "Even if she ends up dead?"

Rio paused, certain in his foresight that her words rang false. He didn't need to reveal that to her, however. ''Or they could grow old together with their children. Or their relationship fails. We don't know their fates... I'll just wish them the best."

Grow old with children. Another complicated mix of reaction hits her--that of both cringe and twisted appeal. She wouldn't know how to raise a child, but one thing she was sure about was how she'd treat them. What parents abandon their child and put them through years of abuse? Definitely not Vaylin. Besides, her spouse would be equally as responsible in raising the child. Would the man sitting next to her make a good Father? Quite likely.

But he's a Jedi.

More importantly, why was she thinking about families? Was she too far gone? She used to disregard those childhood memories with her brothers indifferently. Now she looked back at it fondly. She stood up with such a perplexed look on her face. Cringing at herself.

"Vaylin?"

Confused, she tried clearing up her head of those outlandish thoughts. It must have something to do with this Jedi. “What did you do to me?”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Did you… Force magic or whatever that is? When-when you saved me--or revived or...” her words are disoriented yet desperate. The sudden change of atmosphere disoriented him as well, not fully understanding what she meant by that. “I’m sorry, but I don’t get a word you are saying. Are you alright?”

“After the battle! We haven’t talked about that. I thought… I was dead. Your brother did it...”

“Oh. You… um, you weren’t dead. I didn’t save you. I just… transferred you elsewhere.” At this point he had expected the sudden, volatile shifts of her temperament. The key to handling this situation was calmness, and unfortunately some omission of truth--as evidenced by what he just said which was only half true. “But yes. I healed your wounds. Nothing more.”

“You’re lying.”

“Why don’t you read my mind?” challenged him.

“I can’t--no, that’s not how I do it. I usually just torture the information out of people.”

She held out a hand as usual to start torturing her target until they break, but no Force power was exerted. Perhaps it was only a gesture of intimidation for him? His gaze remained unwavering, mentally and physically ready for what may come next.

She sat back down. Instead of inflicting pain, her hand reached out to grab his lower jaw and chin, tilting his head up a little.

“Look at me. Tell me the truth because I deserve it.” pleaded her with a stern voice, playing into his code of pacifism. There were a few seconds of silence, just them staring deeply into each other. He solemnly nodded.

“I’ll tell you scene by scene. Whether you believe it or not is up to you. But… please, I beg you to not react until I finished talking.”

She released the grasp on his face with a sigh. The touch of her still lingered, though he shrugged away the feelings to start recapitulating the past.

"We… we had to stop you. I tried to do it my way but my brother… he didn't take any chances. Everyone thought you were dead. Technically, you were. Remember that fight in my head? With your Father?"

Vaylin continued her silence, taking up his word of barring reactions. However, she displayed an acknowledging look on her face.

"I healed you the best I could after the battle. Still, you had no pulse. Arcann pulled me and then Senya took you away. I had to go to the Spire and that… mind battle happened. Saw you again. Your Father defeated. Once we were done with that, they were already arranging your funeral."

Immediately she was taken back to Thexan's funeral. It was surreal to be having her own yet there she was--she would've wanted to see it, but she knew there would be more smiles than mourners attending.

"So I… I..." his gaze fell to the ground, gulping before revealing his next action which he wasn't proud of. "I tricked everyone into seeing you actually being in the casket, while I… took you elsewhere. I continued healing. I could sense you clinging to life, and… um, I guess my healing worked. It took much of my energy and I passed out."

The words coming out of his mouth seemed far fetched. How could he do all of that when she obviously died? "You're still not telling the truth. Do I need to do this the hard way?"

"I don't know what else to say. Perhaps you should ask other people. What do you want to hear, exactly?"

She paused. Somehow, not a single thing he said angered her. Yet there's something still missing from his speech; she couldn't point out what precisely. Perhaps it happened when he was out of commission. Suddenly, two glasses of drinks fly lazily towards them. He poured them sneakily while he was talking. "Have some drink, that's what I found from the supplies." as he sipped.

"Is that Tarulan Wine? Give me yours."

With a smile, he handed her his drink. She traded him her tea which he enjoyed as well. She rotated the glass to where his lips used to sip on it, then proceeded to drink it in one go.

"Fine, I believe you for now. It's just that I… feel strange--nevermind that!"

"Strange how?"

"Forget I said anything!"

"Ah. Right. If you need to talk don't hesitate to reach me. I'm going to sleep, but if you want company I can stay up longer."

And she took that wildly out of context. Her mouth moved 'yes' as in stay the night but fortunately nothing came out of it. Another part of her was slightly curious that he chose to sleep instead of meditating as usual. "No. Just go to sleep."

"Goodnight, Vaylin."

Rio was quite surprised that his explanation went swimmingly. It didn't take him long to drift away to sleep; the reason he did so was Vaylin. Specifically at how she disliked seeing him meditate--he didn't want to upset her. He did have a vague idea on the strange feeling she let slip just then, but wouldn't press the subject. Maybe a fresh new day and sleep would improve the mood.

But something was about to change the situation. When he was fast asleep, both of their holocomms rang.

Have they been discovered?

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#swtor #vaylin #fanfic #swtor fanfic #swtor fanart #jedi consular #vaylin x outlander #my art #VayRio #Riiiiiio #sageboi #star wars #star wars OC #star wars fanfic #slow burn #slow burn fic

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ariainstars · 4 years

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Strange Parallels: Star Wars and Joker

Honestly: I never could stand Batman as a person or understand why he is supposed to be a hero. His enemies are all so ludicrously insane and nasty that, excuse me, it doesn’t take much to be better than them.

Bruce Wayne is a rich man, his powerful weapons are something he pays for, so that’s no great achievement either.

In (super)hero stories, heroes and villains need one another to build up a dynamic so that the audience gets interested in them. But from a realistic point of view, and 2019’s Joker is undoubtedly meant to be a realistic story (as far as that is possible), we clearly see that this necessity is not only there for the benefit of the audience.

It is driven home over and over that Arthur’s tragic situation in life was set up before he was even born - like his mother starting an affair with a guy who did not want to be bothered with the consequences, and later having another affair with an abusive guy who repeatedly hurt her child. Arthur was already born a loser, and he remains one, Arthur was already born a loser, and he remains one, except that in the end he decides to take over the tragedy of his life as his very own mantle.

The Wayne’s mansion and their entire way of life is ridiculously opposite to his situation, and the question comes up as to how they made it this far. This is answered in several hints (emphasized also by Murray Franklin, the comedian Arthur admires): winners first and foremost need losers in order to be such.

Just a small part of the Wayne’s wealth would suffice to give both Arthur and his mother at least a decent living and, in his personal case, also some of the medical care he needs; but the “good guys” prefer to leave him and his likes to rot in their hell and, if one of them comes out of there like an avenging devil, they claim that he likes being that way on account of “being jealous of them for having done something with their lives” and that they are heroic if they lock him up at the expense of their taxes, or if they take over the Batman mantle to fight him and the likes.

In the 2019 film, Arthur and Bruce have the same father, which makes the arch-enemies of old half-brothers, a moral twist reminding very much of Cain and Abel; only that in this case, the winner of the conflict is not envious but conceited - he needs someone to look foolish so that he can look cool. The “fool” on the other hand is supposed to shoulder his ungrateful role shrugging to the words of the song “That’s Life”.

Sounds familiar? No matter how much the general audience may hate the notion, Jedi need Sith in order to feel righteous. The whole message of the prequels and of The Clone Wars builds up on this basic truth, and it was partly already set up in the classics with Return of the Jedi, where we repeatedly saw both Obi-Wan and Yoda eschewing their own responsibility for Anakin’s fate.

I often wondered what Darth Maul meant when he said that “At last the Sith would have their revenge.” Revenge for what?

If the Force works like a set of scales, it is only logical to expect that the more one side is convinced of being the embodiment of morals and justice, the more it will be likely that on the other side, people who feel unjustly treated (and they often were), will no longer disdain villainy in order to make them pay for the fact that the “good guys” would never make their hands dirty by stooping down to them and seeing them as their equals.

In both cases, we are dealing with an extremely unbalanced world. And that is as terrible as it sounds: one side will never allow the other to be on the same, or at least a similar, level with them, because they find their validation in superiority. The oppressed, on the other hand, want to believe in the allegedly superior person’s sense of decency as long as they can, resulting in only more exploitation from their side, until the breaking point is reached and anger and frustration burn their way through the respective society.

The blame goes on the ones who made only one major mistake: believing that a winner needs to have some sense of justice and honor, and not understanding that if they had, they wouldn’t be where they are in the first place.

If you want to know what drives someone insane, you’re supposed to read large tomes about psychiatric subjects. You are not supposed to watch films like Joker or the Star Wars prequels (or Carrie, just to name another example) in order to understand what drives a person out of their minds; the media expect you to be entertained by this. But just for a change: try to identify with the person who ends up being the villain, and you might be in for a surprise.

I liked the Batman movies by Tim Burton, with their opera-like music and settings well enough, but I could never warm up to the characters. Coolness seems to make up for everything; believe that you deserve your position, power and popularity and you will be all right.

If these “heroes” mirror the world we live in, if these are the ones we are supposed to look up to and to take as role models… I have a bad feeling about this.

#star wars #the joker #batman #darth maul #arthur fleck #bruce wayne #tim burton #joaquin phoenix #revenge of the sith #joker film #carrie #obi-wan kenobi #yoda

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witchylittlefox · 5 years

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My Thoughts and Feelings About Star Wars as of 2019

I held off sharing my complete feelings on this franchise/fandom because I wanted to wait for TROS to be out. since I have seen it now I’m ready to share how I feel about disney owned Star Wars, the fandom war, reylo, and TROS. Heads up these are my opinions and if we disagree that’s okay! But I would appreciate some respect when it comes to nasty comments because some of the things I’m going to say can be..... controversial in the reylo community.

Preface: I have been a Star Wars fan since I was 4 years old. I somehow figured out how to used a VHS machine and I would insert Return of the Jedi and rewind to watch it over and over again. To this day that movie is my favorite out of all of them. Star Wars was something my brother and I shared together and he would lend me all the EU books. I loved all the stories about Jacen and Jaina Solo at Luke’s jedi academy. I grew up with the prequels and yes, I am a prequel defender but they were corny as hell. So not to toot my own horn but I was very much invested in the lore and commited to the series before Disney bought it.

Disney Star Wars: Disney had absolutely no idea what they were doing with the movies (atleast when it comes to the Skywalkers + everyone related to the OT trio). They spat on the OT character’s legacy. They turn Luke into a character who seems to care nothing about helping his sister. No way in the world would Luke just throw a lightsaber off a cliff. Han and Leia are treated a little better (more so Leia), but Disney is passive agressive with them and make them out to be these horrible parents that decide to send away their son because they’re scared of him. No wonder Ben turned out the way he did. Rey, well......they could of written her better and don’t get me wrong I love aspects of her but this should of been Ben’s time to shine. HE should of been the main character of all the movies. Finn? Would of been cool seeing more perspective from an ex stormtrooper but nahhhh let’s just make him fawn over rey in the first one and then in the second give him this whole arc making us think he’s getting somewhere and then another badly written character ruins it. Poe? Well he atleast got more of an arc than Finn but he’s still so flat.

The Fandom Menace And the Fandom War: I decided after TLJ came out that I was not going to label myself in this fight. It seemed like (or atleast on Tumblr) that you couldn’t be a Reylo if you hated Rian Johnson. Rian was made out to be this “savior” of some sorts, just because he focused the movie to be more Reylo centered. YES he is talented. YES I’m thankful he gave us more of a Reylo plot, But jeez that guy is an ass (I didn’t want to cuss in this but oh well lol). Calling out fans on Twitter? Calling them names? Ridiculing Mike Zeroh? Which say what you will about Mike (not a huge fan of him tbh) but god he’s a fan of the series why are you making fun of him? But those people who are apart of the Fandom Menace are not innocent. A lot of them (NOT ALL, but most) only make videos on Youtube hating on Star Wars because it’s cool. They use the hate to get attention. I’m just not all about that. I agree with them on a lot...but seriously at what cost do we have to allow this. Both sides are annoying and immature and I choose not to take a side. I will like what I want about Star Wars and dislike what I want about Star Wars. I am not going to be a sheep. So yes... I am a Reylo, hardcore since TFA came out in 2015 and yes, I think Rian Johnson is a crappy person and I won’t be seeing any of his movies ever again (besides rewatching TLJ) because I don’t want to give money to someone who fuels the fan war. That being said, I dont support (whether that be my viewership or money) anyone who is in the “Fandom Menace” and does the same for the other side.

Reylo: The only thing I really cared about in this sequel trilogy was Reylo. I honestly started to care less about the other characters like Finn and Poe, which in my opinion is sad and just goes to show how bad Disney was at writing these characters. What got me so choked up about their relationship was how raw it was. It wasn’t some unrealistic clean romance. There was no love at first sight (at least on Rey’s end.. can’t say for Ben). It felt so real to me. They reached a level of intimacy that honestly in my opinion reached higher than sexual intercourse. Unconditional love is something that I hold close to my heart, it may be because of my faith, but the fact that Rey saw through Kylo and could see that at his core he was just Ben, emotionally hurt and lost, just wanting someone to believe in him. And she did! she believed in him when his uncle and mother easily gave up hope for him (again horrible character writing bc uhhh sry but isn’t hope supposed to be a theme with them???). And Ben loved her in return!! He protected her and not this stupid patronizing crap that Finn does (Which side note: THAT PISSES ME OFF SO MUCH LOL. John Boyega was wasted with this stupid character). Ben knew her strength and worth and only did what a man should do in a relationship, not overstep, not take control but add his part to the relationship, creating symbiosis. If you look up the meaning of “Dyad”, this comes up:

specifically, sociology : two individuals (such as husband and wife) maintaining a sociologically significant relationship

They are equal. No one is better than the other. They are two sides of the same coin and they complete each other.

And at last....

TROS: Well crap. This movie was...... not amazing. I will have to say that I have only seen it once at this point and may make an edit to it if I change my mind. Honestly though... I can’t see myself changing my opinion but it may happen after a second viewing. I had been following the leaks and yup pretty much all true. And yep... Ben dies. Not only does he die but he barely gets any time to shine when he is redeemed. I am grateful we finally got the Reylo kiss we all waiting for but did he really have to die??? I know lots are saying he didn’t die because we didn’t see him show up as a force ghost in the end but obviously there is no confirmation from Disney on this. The fact that he died for her to live just supports everything I have said above. But where was her emotion? I expected her to be crying? it seemed to appear like she couldn’t care less, yet she was the one who went in for the kiss first and then she seems to be fine when everyone is rejoicing and hugging in celebration? Why didn’t they add him in as a voice in her head or something (ooh fanfic idea! :) ) Why did Rey call herself Rey Skywalker?! I’m sorry but she DOES NOT desserve that title plus she is still a Palpatine! That does not change anything. Don’t get me started on Palpatine.... bringing him back was the dumbest decision ever and undid everything that Anakin did. Now I would of been slightly okay with it if they got Anakin in to help to defeat him but we only got his voice and a bunch of other jedi’s voices sharing words of guidance (which ngl it was nice hearing Ahsoka) but holy heck you could of atleast added ben to the mix. They could of both heard the voices and ended Palpatine together? Also what happened to Rey and Kylo fighting through the various scenes of the past movies? I thought that was a leak? They did absolutely NOTHING to tie up the OT and PT. It has no ties to PT, besides Anakin’s voice and some of the other jedi in the mix (Mace Windu, Ayala Secura, Yoda, Ahsoka Tano, etc..). I know I’m nitpicking but I am atleast grateful we got their voices I just wish we actually got to see their faces. That’s a lot of negatives though so here is what I did like:

Babu Frik.

Rey’s kind heart ( you see that when she greets the little girl on Pasaana, helps D.O. and the snake creature)

The banter between Finn, Poe, and Rey

C-3PO ( they really did him justice)

Ben (just all of him everything about him)

Lando was pretty good

Seeing Wicket at the end with his child ( I think that’s his child?)

Wedge Antilles showing up for like one second ( although that could be a negative because I thought he was going to be in it more because of the book Resistance Reborn. WHICH OH YEAH..... this movie retconned that book btw! So not only was it a horrible book but everything in it doesnt matter)

Conclusion: So yeah, I am not happy. But in the end I will always love Star Wars no matter what. This franchise has taught me so much about hope, love, and even redemption. It was such a fun ride on here. There were ups and downs ( anyone remember that Reylo discourse a while back lol) but we made it. Even though as Reylos, it didn’t end the way we wanted it... we still were proved right. We fought hard against the antis when they kept trying to tell us Reylo wasn’t a thing and boy were they wrong..... they were very wrong. I don’t know what the future holds in store for Reylo’s story or even Star Wars but all we have to do is look forward and have hope for Ben because just as the great Jedi Master, Luke Skywalker once said:

"No one is ever really gone."

May the Force be with you all.

#tros spoilers #the rise of skywalker #star wars #tros opinion #tros review #fandom menace #reylo #reylo fam

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maulusque · 6 years

Text

here’s an idea

some of the jedi actually have their shit together re: the morality of a slave army.

Namely Aayla Secura and Plo Koon. From the start of the war, they both voiced opposition to taking part, specifically citing the clones’ situation. The Council convinced them to take part as generals anyway, on the basis that at least they could do some good for the clones as generals, whereas if they sat out and let another take their place, they wouldn’t be able to do anything. They feel like hypocrites, like slave owners, but they both vow to do everything in their power to see the clones freed. After the war. And the war just keeps, happening, you know? It seems like there’s always somewhere where they and their troops are needed, innocent civilians to save, and they can prioritize civilian lives over the clones’ lives, right? I mean, at least the clones are trained for this. They both care as much as they can for the men they have, but they still lead them to battle, lead them to their deaths, requisition more troops from Kamino with the same forms they requisition more blasters with.

Eventually, as the war drags on and on and on, and their best intentions for the clones are stymied by exhaustion, death, and bureaucracy, both Plo and Aayla realize, independently, that they need to take drastic action if they want to be able to consider themselves Jedi, or even good people. Because they haven’t done right by the clones. Whatever their intentions, they have been complicit in slavery, in child abuse, in murder and torture. Making the clones wait until the end of the war for their freedom is cruel and inhumane, and unless they prioritize freedom and justice for their men now, then they are no better than the slave lords of the outer rim, who sit in their massive palaces with fortunes built on slavery. So, they reach out. They talk to their Commanders. Bly and Wolffe put them in touch with Cody, and with each other. Cody and the other Commanders have been talking, in secret. They, too, have realized that the war isn’t going to end anytime soon, and even if it does, what happens to them?

Cody is reluctant to trust Aayla and Plo, but Bly and Wolffe vouch for them. He asks them, if you are truly willing to help us, you have to realize that this might mean quitting the Jedi Order. This might mean turning against your fellow Jedi. Are you willing to do that? Are you willing to, say, kill Mace Windu, or Depa Billaba, or Ahsoka Tano, if it means our freedom? Aayla and Plo say yes, they are. And they are. This had been one of the toughest choices they’ve had to make in their lives, when it should have been one of the easiest. They are Jedi, and they will fight against injustice and slavery wherever it may be, no matter who is perpetrating it.

So Cody sets them to work. Aayla reaches out to her old master, Quinlan Vos. In this universe, instead of being a racist dickhead, his anti-clone sentiment is born from the fact that he utterly disagrees with the idea of Jedi waging war, and has transformed that into resenting the clones. He’s spent the entire war being literally as far away from it as possible, ignoring the Council as much as he can. Eventually, though, he undergoes a mr. darcy-like transformation, realizes what an asshole he’s been, and when Aayla comes knocking, he’s already been smuggling troopers slated for decomissioning to safe planets.

Plo Koon reaches out to Ahsoka. In the time since she’s left the order, she’s done a lot of growing up. Outside of the stress of constant war, and the influence of the Council and Anakin, she’s done a lot of thinking and also undergone Character Growth, realizing how unfair the clones’ situation is, and how she contributed to it, how she ignored the power differential between them. She jumps at the chance to help. (it does take her a bit to get used to the idea that she’s not a leader here, not a commander- she’s a useful agent, and her input is appreciated, but she and the Jedi with her are not in charge). Ahsoka approaches Rex, he tells her what happened to Fives. Ahsoka does some digging, and uncovers the chips. She takes the info straight to Rex, who, with the other Commanders and the medics, coordinate a massive, secret de-chipping operation under the guise of every trooper needing a vaccine to combat some new disease making the rounds.

Once Cody and the others are fairly sure that the majority of the army has been dechipped, the Commanders make their move, and the entire GAR goes on strike. Every Commander has passed down orders to their captains, and the captains have passed it down to their men, so everyone is briefed on what to do and how to behave. Any troops currently engaged in battle abandon whatever objective they had, fighting only to their extraction point. GAR ships abandon contested space, re-centering around Republic planets and bases. Troopers are ordered to only perform the duties necessary to keep the ships running and keep everyone alive. Food, sanitation, medical, and defense if they are attacked. Many battalions are essentially dead in space, or on whatever planet they were on, because their Jedi leaders won’t relinquish the bridges of their ships, but their troops refuse to fight. So Aayla, Plo, and the other allied Jedi are able to take their troops to these stranded groups, giving them supplies, taking the wounded, helping them defend against separatist forces if they need it.

Cody and the other Commanders have put together a document, and they send two copies. One to the Senate, and one to the Jedi Council. It is a list of grievances, followed by a list of demands.

Needless to say, the Jedi Council are forced into a negotiation pretty damn quick. The Commanders insist that a representative of the Senate, someone with the authority to speak for them, be present too. The clones refuse to send their representatives to Coruscant, because they don’t trust the Jedi Council or the Senate not to execute them. Anakin Skywalker volunteers his ship as a neutral place- sure, the 501st is on strike, but it’s a Jedi ship, so both parties should feel about as equally uncomfortable.

At the negotiations, representing the Clone Troopers: Commander Cody, Commander Wolffe, Commander Bly, and Captain Rex. Plo Koon, Aayla Secura, Quinlan Vos, and Ahsoka Tano are there to, mostly to say what the clones say, but louder and with a Jedi voice, so the council might actually listen. Present on behalf of the Jedi: Yoda, Mace Windu, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Ki-Adi-Mundi, and, ironically enough, Plo Koon, who volunteered when Yoda asked for Council members willing to participate in the negotiations. Present on behalf of the Senate: Senator Bail Organa, Senator Halle Burtoni of Kamino, and Chancellor Palpatine. Anakin is there, too, of course. It’s his ship, after all. Cody starts off by re-listing their grievances, the crimes committed against the Clone Troopers (he’s left the chips off the list- they’re still not 100% sure who’s behind it and don’t want to endanger the troops still chipped). Yoda and Mace try to interrupt him many times, but Cody just keeps talking over them, and Plo Koon keeps going “no let him finish this sounds interesting”.

When Cody finishes, Halle Burtoni erupts into a rant about “traitors” and “defective products”. Senator Organa thinks Cody has a point. A good one. A lot of good ones, actually. Palpatine is quiet, silently calculating how he can turn this to his advantage. Yoda spouts off with a bunch of Jedi platitudes about perspective, the greater good, blah blah blah. Cody just looks at him and says “sir, you’re full of shit.” Before anyone can get on his case for it, Rex stands and starts reading off their demands. Obi-Wan keeps interrupting, with things like “surely, we can negotiate” or “I agree that you and your men have a right to these things, but in war, certain sacrifices must be made” and “can’t this wait until after we defeat the separatists?” Rex tells him to shut the hell up and listen for once in his goddamn life (quote). Obi-Wan turns to Anakin and says “Anakin, I thought you taught your men more respect than that!” but Anakin says “Actually, Master, I agree with Rex.” Before THAT can blow up, Yoda tries to calm things down with “discuss your requests, we must” but Wolffe’s like “Not requests. Demands. We are not here to negotiate, we are here to tell you what you must do if you want to keep your army.” There’s arguing. There’s yelling. Aayla makes an impassioned speech about freedom. Anakin and Ahsoka have a quick hushed aside, in which it takes Anakin about 30 seconds to decide he’s quitting the Order, too. Yoda and Mace ask Plo to back them up, but he just points at Wolffe and goes “my son”. Cody, Rex, Bly, and Wolffe are doing an excellent job of looking like the only professionals in the room.

Eventually, Bail Organa asks everyone to calm down. “Commanders, I hear your grievances, and I understand that you have been treated wrongly. I propose that I introduce a bill in the Senate, to legally grant your demands-by the way, can I have a copy of that list?- We might have to do some arm-twisting to get the votes, but if you and your brothers hold steadfast in your strike, I’m sure it won’t take too long for the Senators to come around- especially those whose planets are close to Separatist activity.” Yoda mumbles something about needing to meditate before taking any action. Bail turns to Palpatine, who hasn’t said a word so far. “What do you think, Chancellor? Such a bill would move through the Senate much faster with your backing.”

Palpatine has been watching the proceedings, and thinking. This could totally work out for him. Anakin and Obi-Wan are on opposite sides of this debate, and he didn’t even have to do anything to drive this wedge between them. Anakin is primed to declare against the Jedi Order. If he plays his ace card soon, the Clone Troopers massacre the Jedi, and, combined with their current strike, is more than enough justification for him to declare them all defective traitors and have them all killed via the chips, leaving Anakin with no one and nothing. Then, it’s a simple matter of unleashing him on the Separatists, having him commit more and more atrocities in the name of victory... unless, of course, Anakin decides to help the clones and participate in Order 66 himself, in which case, his job is done! And he might not even need to kill Padme to do it! At least, not until after the children are born and he can assess whether he wants one of them as an apprentice instead of their father. So Palpatine stands, walks over to Cody, and says, “Commander Cody, the time has come. Execute Order 66.”

And Cody says “Fuck you, Chancellor.” and punches him in the face. In the ensuing shitstorm, a lot of stuff is revealed. Palpatine is a sith lord- the angry Force lightning kind of made it obvious. Anakin has good reflexes, jumping in front of the lightning and absorbing the blast to protect Cody (he’s the most powerful Force-sensitive in a thousand years at least, he’ll be fine). Rex has good aim and good priorities- his pistols are drawn and Palpatine has two smoking holes where his eyes were before Anakin has finished screaming and collapsing dramatically. “Oh my fucking god,” Mace Windu says, realizing that they’ve been living in the pocket of a Sith Lord for a good decade and that he is an idiot. Wolffe is trying to get past Plo Koon, who jumped in front of him the moment Cody punched Palpatine. Aayla and Bly both tried to jump in front of each other (Bly won, because Aayla may be a Jedi but she’s shorter than he is), and Ahsoka, who didn’t get the chance to jump in front of anybody, just goes “yikes”. Obi-Wan, who is currently evaluating all of his life choices and also just how well he really knows his Commander, goes “agreed”.

Anyway Bail gets the bill passed and is elected chancellor, and immediately enters into negotiations with the Separatists (dooku mysteriously vanished, high-tailing it out of there when his master died, and suddenly the separatist forces are much less blood-thirsty and sentient-rights violating when he’s not leading them). Yoda retires to a swamp planet, Mace decides to de-centralize the Jedi Order, re-write a lot of rules and Jedi philosophy, and moves to a new Temple being built on Hoth or something.

The clones are freed, given citizenship, backpay, and reparations, funded mostly by the Senate taxing the shit out of the Banking Clans and the Trade Federation. They objected strenuously, but couldn’t really do much about it with an entire clone army breathing down their necks. There’s a big search for a home for the clones, and a planet that will agree to host them. This is when the clan leaders of the Mandalorian Houses come forward- not the New Mandalorians, but the Mandalorians of the traditional, warrior culture, kicked out of Mandalore by the new government, living as a diaspora all over the galaxy. They say they will claim the Clones as theirs, accept them as their own clan. Their motives are manifold- one, the Clones were trained by Mandalorians, including Jango Fett, and clone culture borrows a lot from the Mandalorians. Secondly, it’ll really piss off Satine Kryze’s government, Thirdly, the promises made to the clones in Organa’s bill could be leveraged into a win-win for the Mandalorian Clans and the Clones. The Clones get their citizenship, and the Mandalorian Clans get recognized as an independent political entity, separate from New Mandalore, and as such, not subject to their laws, and entitled to a Senator of their own, as well as protection and recognition for their citizens spread throughout the Galaxy.

Additionally, many planets offer citizenship programs to the clones, especially those whose populations had been decimated by the war. Governments are desperate for able-bodied people to come in and fill in the economic gap left by the war to stave off economic collapse. The Senate further creates programs to make it easier for clones to gain citizenship on planets that might not be so eager for them to live there, and for clones who are disabled and unable to work. So many clones end up with dual citizenship- Mandalorian Clans, and their home planet of choice.

Many choose to stay in the army- it’s familiar, it’s easier than trying to find a job and pay rent (especially when you’ve never heard of a job, salary, or rent growing up), it’s where their brothers are, and hey, they’re getting paid now. Anakin talks to Rex, and together, they take the 501st to the Outer Rim and wreck shit on the Hutts and their slave empire. After fulfilling his childhood dream of liberating Tattooine, Anakin retires to raise his children with his wife. Wolffe spends a few years traveling the galaxy alone, seeing new places and meeting new people. Eventually he returns to Coruscant, and when he leaves, a newly retired Plo Koon goes with him, and together they see as much of the galaxy as they can. Cody and Rex spend a while helping to settle their vod’e, taking the cadets and babies from Kamino and setting up home bases all over the galaxy, where they are raised by their older brothers. Cody discovers that he loves teaching. Rex finds out that he really likes kids. Eventually, Cody and Rex retire, but they still spend a lot of time with the clone children, and with their brothers. Ahsoka drops by every once in a while. Bail spends his career rooting out corruption and establishing requirements that Republic planets must elect their senators by popular vote. Everyone is reasonably content, oh and also Fives didn’t really die, he was wearing a blaster-proof vest and went into hiding, he rescued Echo and they both live the rest of their lives happily together.

#Clone Wars #SW TCW #cody #rex #aayla secura #plo koon #jedi not being stupid

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