Have You Ever Asked Yourself: “What Does The Skunk Say?” Unmute To Find Out

what we have now

Cal awakens on Tanalorr, and what seems to be a perfect day begins to go wrong. Post-Jedi: Survivor with spoilers. Rated PG-13ish for established Merrical. Angst, grief, hope, love, ~2450 words.

--

The morning light of Tanalorr filters gently through cracks in the temple ceiling, sending down soft, gold-edged rays through the small private chamber where he and Merrin have set up a room.  Cal mumbles, rolling over on the makeshift bed and taking half the covers with him.  Merrin is warm and sleepy beside him, her skin soft against his own, and he draws her closer, breathing in the sweet smell of her hair.

“We have slept in again, Cal Kestis,” she murmurs throatily.  “I blame you, of course.  You kept me from my rest.”

“Someone was awfully frisky last night, I seem to recall,” Cal yawns.  He hardens slightly, remembering her insistent kisses last night, how she eagerly undressed him, her hands, her mouth, her --

He lets out a long breath.  They have work to do this morning with the others, and he knows he shouldn’t let himself get distracted.  No matter how much he might like to be.

“Still thinking about it, are you?” Merrin asks, amused.  She rolls over and props herself up on one elbow, leaning over him.  He drinks in the sight of her, soft gray skin and dark tattoos, a wicked grin.  He bites back a groan.  

Her gaze flicks back, and she peers under the covers with a knowing smirk.  “Ahh.  I like the way you think.”

“Hey, come on, now.  We promised we’d check in,” Cal half-protests.  “The Path needs us to get this housing ready, and we need to have that meeting with --”

The familiar sound of BD’s servos whirs as the little droid hops over to them, blithely ignorant of their nudity and innuendo.  Cal sighs, drawing the sheets higher over Merrin and himself.  

“Cal, my dear Jedi, you said you were going to teach the droid to knock.”

“I’ve been busy!” Cal says.  Merrin simply raises one eyebrow and gives him one of those looks, the sort that makes his brain short-circuit and his pulse quicken.  For a moment he’s tempted to tell BD-1 to come back later, that he’d made a mistake with the time and really the meeting with Cere was for tomorrow, not today.

But something disquiets him, a frisson rippling through the Force, there and gone before he can put a name to it.  His arousal vanishes, and he looks away from Merrin, unsettled.

“Cal?”  She sits up, the blanket falling down around her waist, the golden light bathing her skin in a warm glow.  “What is it?”

He shakes his head.  “I don’t know.  Something felt… off.  I’m not sure what it means.”  He sighs.  “Probably just guilt about how late we’re going to be.  We’d better get going.  Make it up to you later?”  He gives her a small smile, and is gratified when she returns it twofold.

Cal sends BD-1 off to wait as they get dressed, but they meet him at the front of the temple, where he is waiting patiently for them.  Cal bends to lower a hand and BD clambers up to his regular perch as they step outside into the fresh air.  The glorious Tanalorr morning greets them with misty light, and brightly colored banners ripple from the temple in the breeze.  Gardens stretch alongside the path, tall leaves fluttering in the wind, fruits and vegetables beginning to swell and show in colors of scarlet, violet, emerald.

The three of them travel through the gardens and back along the creekside path leading away from the temple.  Merrin seems content, but Cal cannot help but look over his shoulder as they walk.  There is only BD-1 there, cheerful and loyal as always, but there’s still a nagging feeling, something skittering at the back of his mind.  

He tries to ignore it, his feet tracing the familiar trail alongside Anchorite Creek.  They cross the new stone bridge, a beautiful melding of angular Jedha architecture with jeweled motifs unique to Tanalorr; the lilac-blossomed larien tree, the clever waterhare, the carvings of the Koboh Abyss.  He always appreciates this bridge and the way his footsteps ring on the stone, but for a moment it almost feels like its solid arch tremors beneath his feet.

“Did you feel that?” Cal asks.  BD lets out a beep in the negative.  Merrin shakes her head.

“Feel what?”

“Nothing,” Cal says, stone solid beneath his feet, and he tries to believe himself.  We’ve made a perfect world.  What is there to worry about?

They meet back up with the others at the village, which is already bustling at this early hour.  The sight cheers him, and his odd mood fades into the background.  He takes a deep breath and smells the morning meal on the breeze, rich with spice; Pyloon’s of Tanalorr keeps Greez busy, even with several residents working with him as sous chefs.  He and Merrin will have to stop in for a bowl of waterhare stew when they next get a chance.

They keep heading toward their destination, passing Narkis Anchorites working with refugees from the Hidden Path, raising another set of new residences.  Cal nods to them as they pass.  He recognizes some of the Anchorites from Jedha.  There are new members of their order, too, only identifiable by the Tanalorr-lilac stripe they wear on their sleeves.

Not everyone wears the garb of the Anchorites; droids roll or walk along the dirt streets on their business, and plenty of people with bare faces wave as they make their way to the Archives.  A few of the refugees he recognizes from his days as a Padawan, other survivors besides himself: a young woman with her dark hair in tight braids, a tall man with olive skin and piercing blue eyes.  Pride unfurls in his chest, pride and a fierce protectiveness.  They’ve built so much here.  And there is still so much more to do.

Many of those who cannot help in the physical efforts of building work in the new Archives, cataloging their growing knowledge of the Jedi Order and its history, and it’s here they head, Cal keenly aware they’re late.  That must be the reason he’s feeling off.  He knows exactly which slightly disappointed look Cere will be wearing --

The smell of smoke, ash dancing in the flame-choked air, red and black --

Cal staggers, sagging against the door as it slides open.  “Cal!” Merrin cries, slipping a steady arm around him.  On his other side, a familiar man in robes braces against him, helping Merrin to keep him upright.

“Cal!  Have you taken ill?” Master Cordova asks.  Together he and Merrin lead Cal to a seat near one of the desks, where he bows over himself, breathing hard.  BD-1 chitters at his shoulder.

“You don’t feel it?” Cal gasps.  He holds out his hands, ash coating his fingertips.  He doesn’t understand.  “Look at my hands.  There’s something terribly wrong --”

Merrin and Master Cordova look at his hands, but they seem worried, exchanging concerned glances.  “I will get Cere,” says Merrin, and claps Cal on the shoulder, her hand squeezing him tightly against his jacket.  “We will figure this out, Cal.  Together.”  

Cal looks down at his hands again.  They’re clean once more, and his head reels.  What’s happening?

“Tell me what you sense, Cal,” says Master Cordova, kneeling carefully beside him.  His brown eyes, always so wise, seem troubled.  Cal knows it’s because of him.  He tries to center himself, reaching for the Force, but it feels muted and hazy, muffled somehow.

“I saw fire,” he manages.  “Fire and ash.”

“A memory, perhaps sensed by your psychometry?”

“No, this didn’t feel like a normal memory,” Cal tries to explain.  “It feels like it’s something that doesn’t belong here.  Like something that isn’t real, that never happened.”  He gazes around the room, drawing comfort from its soaring shelves of twinkling datapads, the silver globes lighting the hall, the sweet smell of larienwood incense.  He tries to ground himself in the library, in all they’ve built here.  “It couldn’t have happened.”

“It may have been a vision, then,” Cordova muses, getting to his feet and sitting down on the chair beside Cal.  “The Force may be sending you a message of things to come.”

Cal shakes his head in frustration.  He’s not a Padawan.  “I know we can have visions from the Force, Master Cordova, but I always feel so tightly bound to the past.  I’ve only had visions of the future in places where the Force is magnified and concentrated, like Ilum or Bogano….  The past has always been so much easier for me to access.  This didn’t feel the same way.”

“Perhaps that’s changing,” says Cere.  Cal lifts his head to greet her, and their eyes meet--

She’s so light in his arms.  How could someone so powerful, so strong, be so, so still?

Cal recoils, panting.  The smoke chokes him, blinds him, engulfs him.  He’s lost in it, reaching for his lightsaber, finding nothing there.  He cups his hands around his mouth, calling, hoping, begging.  “Cere -- I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I should have been there --”

“You okay there, scrapper?” 

Cal opens his eyes.  The smoke has vanished as quickly as it had come, and the temple soars over him, golden daylight streaming through its windows.  Bode gives him a broad, easy grin, smile lines crinkling at the edges of his eyes.  Dagan’s lightsaber hums in his palm.

“This isn’t right,” Cal whispers.  “It isn’t real --”

He raises a gloved hand.  Imperial black against crisp ISB white.  He lets the frantic rage shriek through him, a desperate eruption of pure hate boiling forth, he wants this, needs this, a weapon, he’s nothing but a weapon --

The temple shatters around him, Tanalorr shatters around him, and he remembers everything.

***

“Cal!  Cal.  Come back to me, Jedi,” Merrin murmurs throatily.  He realizes her arms are around him, holding him tight against her chest, his cheek nestled against the soft skin between her breasts.  Her twin heartbeats pulse in his ear, a metronome grounding him here, now, safe.

For a moment, they simply stay there.

“What happened?” she asks in a soft voice.

Cal reluctantly sits up, nearly hitting his head on the ceiling.  They’re in the Mantis, back in one of the narrow bunks they insist on squeezing into together.  He knows they could sleep separately, but neither of them like to do it anymore if they can help it.

“I dreamed of Tanalorr.  The way it should have been.”  His throat constricts, and it takes him a moment to steady his voice.  “It was beautiful, Merrin.”  He wants to tell her everything.  The new Archives, the lush gardens, the voices in the streets; Cordova… Cere…. 

Instead he buries his face in the crook between her neck and her shoulder, and breathes in, and breathes out.

She strokes his hair gently, fingers twining through the strands that tickle the back of his neck.  She presses a kiss to his forehead.  “We will make it so, Cal.  I promise you.”

“Maybe.  I hope so.  But she’ll never see it.”

Her fingers still, then shift for her hand to cup his cheek.  She slowly lifts his chin until he’s gazing at her, her dark eyes bright.  “No, she will not.  That is something we cannot change.”  She blinks, and a flicker of her own grief passes across her face, a painful mirror to his own.  “I miss her too.  Cere and Cordova both, but Cere… she was part of our family.”  Tears glisten, unshed but unashamed, in her eyes.

They haven’t talked of Cere this openly in weeks, busy with fighting the Empire on Koboh and taking care of Kata.  But now the loss is here, sitting in the space between their breath, and the wound aches so, so much.  

Anger flares within him.  How can his mind have given him so much detail of Tanalorr vibrant and growing, of a world where they’d truly won, and yet so little of Cere?  When he would have given anything to see her again, to speak with her -- to apologize --

But he remembers how his mind had tried to tell him he was dreaming, and his heart sinks.  He had known.  Even in the midst of a dream that felt realer than real, he’d known.  

There is no bringing Cere back, not even in a dream.

Cal swallows, feeling sick.  It’s all a mess, and he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to feel about any of it.  The Jedi Order would tell him to let it go, but the Jedi Order itself is dust and ashes, and he feels the feelings anyway, Order be damned.  

Grief feels different now than it did as a child.  It’s no less confusing than it was then, but back then he’d been so desperate to survive, so powerless to protect himself, that he’d shoved the feelings down as far as they could go.  Now the feelings and the Force are both as powerful as they’ve ever been.  He feels the Force crackling throughout him, body and soul, straining to be used.  He’s healed his connection… but is that such a good thing, now?  There’s violence poisoning his connection, an intoxicating rage, a searing hatred, the darkness…

He shivers, and he steps away from it, for now.

“I don’t know--” His breath hitches.  There’s water tracking at the edges of his eyelids, a burn in his chest.  “Even through everything, even when we were apart, she was always guiding me.  And without her, I don’t know if I can be enough.  For Tanalorr… for the Path… for Kata….”  Imperial black on ISB white.  “For you.”  

“You are enough for me, Cal Kestis,” she says, and he sinks back into her embrace.  

“But the future --”

“Is what we can make of it,” Merrin says, her voice steely.  “We will find the way together, you and I.  That is how we will honor Cere and Cordova.  And the Jedi, and my sisters.  And if you stumble in the darkness, I will lead you by the hand; and if I do not see the path, your light will guide me.”  She kisses him, her open mouth slanting over his, then pulls back.  She blazes with determination, so beautiful he can hardly bear it.  “Do you trust me?”

The world falls away, and Cal lets it.  There is only this moment, shimmering between them.  The grief and darkness will be there waiting for him when he returns, he knows that much, but for now, there is only Merrin.  He takes her hand in his, and he knows that no matter what lies ahead, the two of them are bound together.

“Always,” he whispers.

She smiles, and the world feels perfect once again.

Protective Rage Obi Wan

Here is another story idea that is the culmination of several ideas that I need to get out of my brain soup. 

It starts on the bridge of the Negotiator, in orbit over Coruscant. It is a full bridge, including Rex and Cody, Anakin, Obi Wan, and Ahsoka. In comes a very injured, filthy Quinlan Vos limping in (among other injuries is a compound leg fracture that is visibly gangrenous). 

Vos presses a data chip into Obi Wan’s hand and tells him that it is coded just before he collapses. He is delirious and rambling about needing to protect ‘them’ so that ‘he’ doesn’t have to deal with Vos any longer, with some of the phrases he uses in regards to himself remind Cody of how Fox speaks (Everything was sparked by Fox having a shitty day, what with the abuse by the senate and the mind control by the Chancellor. He said some poorly phrased mean things to Vos, who took them a little bit too much to heart.  Something to the effect of “Take your abnormal powers and go do something useful with them”) and how Vos thought ‘he’ had seen him beyond being a Jedi and he was tired of having his heart broken (Here Jedi are called Abnormal, child stealing freaks of nature so often that hearing any one part brings the rest). 

Obi Wan is basically cradling his head and soothing him while Vos lay on the floor. He refused to let the medics anywhere near Vos, saying that Vos’s gifts (his psychometry) were such that he could only be treated by a Jedi healer (The medics are visibly and audibly unhappy about this but Obi Wan actually makes it an order).   Obi Wan has them call the Jedi Temple to send Bant up for Quinlan, also asking her to bring the her decoder (Reeft had built one for each of his crechemates) as that was the only thing that could decode the data chip that Vos had given him (Obi Wan’s was in his quarters in the temple).

Bant and a Padawan Healer arrive, wearing slightly strange looking robes and gloves. The Padawan takes Obi Wan’s place sitting at Vos’s head, while Bant starts pulling out crystals and other things to diagnose everything that is wrong before they move him. Obi Wan takes the decoder and steps away to read the data chip. Bant turns to the Padawan and goes: “Pop quiz, why do we have special gear for Master Vos?” The Padawan responds after a moment of thought “His Psychometry is so strong and his injuries have wiped his shields , so without the specially made clothing we are wearing or shields as strong as Master Kenobi, he would feel anything and everything that got within about two feet of him. That would likely drive him into insanity and death.” (The Medics, who had been looking mutinous that they were not allowed to treat someone on the ship, started to look a little sheepish).

 Though Obi Wan still appears to be entirely calm as he read the information that was on the data chip (The inhibitor chips and Order 66, maybe proof that Sidious was trying to turn Anakin, maybe something about how Sidious had fucked with Anakin’s mind, leading both sides of the war) but very abruptly both the Padawan and Ahsoka (Not Anakin, he is a bit oblivious empathically) faces turn to look at Obi Wan as he very politely and very calmly excuses himself. 

Bant, still working on stabilizing Vos, says absently “Huh. Haven’t felt Obi get that angry in years.” Everyone in the room just looks at where Obi Wan had exited, because he does not seem angry. Bant continues with “Last time was when Anakin was about 11, his writing teacher didn’t like him and was deliberately sabotaging his work.  Obi found out, left Anakin with Quinn and Aayla, then proceeded to track the teacher down and beat the shit out of him. He threw him through two windows, methodically breaking every bone in both his body, all the while calmly explaining why the teacher’s behavior was unacceptable. As soon as the teacher healed, he decided that teaching was no longer his calling. Last I heard he was somewhere in wild space, trying to stay as far away from Obi or Anakin as possible.”

Cody receives a message from one of the hanger crew saying that General Kenobi had left the ship, stating that he had some business to attend to. In the background is Anakin, looking shocked and going “That’s what happened to that teacher.”

Meanwhile, the Senate is in session. It is one of the rare sessions it is being broadcast live to the entire galaxy, so there are new crews recording when High General Obi Wan Kenobi enters and uses the Force to launch himself into The Supreme Chancellor’s pod.  Obi Wan breaks the Chancellor’s jaw (thus preventing him from speaking and activating Order 66), and proceeds to very methodically beat the shit out of him.  All the while ranting very calmly about why the Supreme Chancellor's actions were unacceptable. He spends quite a bit of time on “How dare you enslave the troopers” and “You are not laying a hand on Anakin again” and “Killing off my family is bad”. 

Though he can’t speak, it becomes clear that he is the Sith they have been looking for. There is force lightning, which just seems to be absorbed by Obi Wan’s rage. A red lightsaber is pulled. Obi Wan catches that arm, breaks it and throws the lightsaber away.  Eventually he kills Palpatine, either just beating him to death, or pulling his own lightsaber and decapitating him.  Then he uses the force to pull Amedda to him. 

He’s just holding Amedda above the rotunda and says to him, “Now that that is taken care of. I’m sure you are just as concerned with the Clones' lack of rights as I am, right?”

Amedda has never been more sure in his life that he is very concerned about Clone rights.

Obi Wan beams at the entire Senate and says, clear as a bell, “Oh good, I had hoped I would only have to kill one politician today.”

With Obi just standing there, holding a dangling Amedda, the Clone Rights bill is passed unanimously, full citizenship is granted along with guaranteed representation in the Senate. The senate is sure that they all get back pay, all the way back to their decatning date, since they have trained all of their lives. The Clones are given a small planet with its own terraformed moon in the mid rim.  The Kaminoans decide that they will be handing all of their research off to the Clones without argument. 

Obi Wan lands the pod, puts Amedda down, and waits patiently to be arrested. He is very aware that he just beat a man to death on galactic wide and live.  He is more than willing to face the consequences (he has no idea what the consequences are).  No one can quite figure out if what he had done was illegal or not, technically the Supreme Chancellor was a Sith and the leader of the Separtist so as both a high general and a Jedi, Obi Wan was allowed to kill him. However he did just beat a politician to death on live TV.  The Coruscant Guard looks at each other going, “uhhh, he just beat a man to death…for us. We’re not arresting him.” 

The GAR look at each other and go ‘soooo…clearly General Kenobi is the leader of the Vode.’ Commander Cody is really glad he is in his armor because he is having a highly inappropriate reaction (he is not the only one having a highly inappropriate reaction. Most of the galaxy may be having a bit of a crisis.)

The Separatists declare they are surrendering to High General Kenobi.

Deathwatch sees this fight and collectively goes “Kenobi is our Mandalore, right?” They capture Maul, who is also a bit conflicted (he hates Kenobi, but he might hate his former Master more and the violence was beautiful), which lets them capture him and deliver him to the Coruscant temple (They are the sixth crime syndicate to deliver their leaders to the temple, having decided to go straight.) They are very clear that the Darksaber is for Obi Wan Kenobi. Death watch decides that they need to prove themselves to their new Mandalore, for having not realized he was their leader earlier. They rewatch the fight, realize that their Mandalore has FEELINGS about slavery, also loves the clone army. So they set off into the galaxy to prove their loyalty by eliminating slavery, and possibly by offering assistance to any clone that they come across. 

The New Mandalorians talk amongst themselves and are like “Look, I know we’re pacifists but…” and even Satine is going, “No, no that’s fair.”  There is some more furtive discussion and they start going “Maybe we can have a little violence?” and Satine’s advisers start talking about how Satine and Obi Wan had a Thing once upon a time and wouldn’t it be nice if he was their Duke, maybe as a way to offer the Clones citizenship (I am feral over CodyWan but this could also be a lead in to Obitine  or Cody/Satine/Obi Wan.)

Mace Windu and Yoda arrive at some point and Obi Wan asks about Vos. Fox is hovering right there, trying to pretend that he is not concerned (Vos had not come to bother them in weeks after Fox had screamed at him after a really shitty day. Fox does not want to admit that he missed the Kiffar). Obi Wan, with an eavesdropping Fox, is told that Vos’s leg had been broken and ignored for at least five days, that he was likely to lose it (He had to have dropped at least 100 levels to get a break like that). They also say that he is not healing (Fox’s words did some deep damage, triggered other issues, and left Vos feeling like he had nothing to wake up for.) like he should and he is comatose in the Halls of Healing. Fox manages to get permission to follow them to check on Vos, for “official” reasons (he says it’s because his men would be concerned and to keep them from cluttering up the Halls of Healing. It absolutely has nothing to do with the way his stomach dropped when he heard that Vos had been hurt). 

On the ride back over to the Temple, Mace and Obi Wan talk about  Vos’s ramblings at the beginning. From the way they talk it really isn’t clear if they are aware that Fox is the one that spoke so harshly to Vos or not but Fox recognizes his own words.  Once they get to the Halls of Healing it becomes really obvious, really quickly that Fox being there is helping Vos heal.

At some point Obi Wan finds out that he is considered the unofficial, and if he wanted official, leader of the Mandalore sector.  By this point he has already left the Order to lead the Vode (and get together with Cody for the CodyWan version).  Anakin and Padme have also joined them on their shiny new planet and are happily pregnant.

when there are only straights on the fandom and you have no one to share the LGBTQ+ content with

THIS IS SO DAMN CUTE!

I'm not okay. Took a mental health day to do my part and make some art about it. No matter the opposition, we won't be erased. A world without trans people has never existed, and it never will! 🏳️‍⚧️

May this piece be a small light in the darkness for those in need of comfort and hope. Feel free to share/re-post elsewhere if this resonates with you. Just please make sure you include the alt text!

Yeah, still good.

reblog if you’ve read fanfictions that are more professional, better written than some actual novels. I’m trying to see something

New poster for The Rise of Skywalker debuted at D23

Okay, okay so I’m thinking of an au mashup in which Obi Wan gets de-aged in the middle of the clone wars, except Obi Wan is now at the age when his prophetic visions and slightly offputting nature were at they’re height.

I tend to follow the belief, in Seer!Obi wan fics, that Yoda took one look at the 8 year old Obi Wan who keeps telling him increasingly creepy little snippets of his future and the looked at Sifo-Dyas rocking back and forth in the corner doodling the same face over and over, with slight variations, muttering insanities as Dooku tries to lure him out with a trail of biscuits and tea, and just went. No. Absolutely not. Not doing this again. And the council at the time just sort of agreed to put a mental block in place to stop Obi Wan from growing up into Sifo-Dyas Junior.

This is was all fine and dandy, until Obi Wan is suddenly 7 again without this block in place and planets away from anyone capable of rebuilding it again. Force forbid they allow Skywalker a go at it.

Now there’s an unsettling redheaded child making very worrying, very creepy comments.

Anakin: awww, aren’t you a cute!!!

Baby!Obi-Wan: Your hands drip with the blood of trillions, Your arrogance veils the sins you wish not to confront, Your decrepit body shall live on long past your own death, in a cage of its own making.

Anakin: : - 0

Baby!Obi-Wan: but thank you : - )

Ahsoka and Rex are very reluctant to be near the baby after he tells them how everyone they love will die and they shall continue on, surrounded but alone all the same.

Cody and the 212th choose to endure the comments on how they will die enslaved, put down by the masters that created them, deprived of personhood and kindness because creepy baby or not, that’s they’re general right there, they can figure all the freakiness out after the they’ve comforted the child. (They are immensely worried over this, though)

It’s not like Obi wan is enjoying this either. He doesn’t want to predict all this, it won’t stop!

Dooku, on the other hand is thrilled. He kind of regrets not keeping his lover Sifo-Dyas around as his own personal fortune cookie machine / Magic 8 ball. Not cause he misses him or anything. Not at all. He just thinks the tactical advantage would be wonderful! (This is slightly ignorant of how unstable and harmful Sifo’s visions were) To have his Grandpadawan back in this impressionable, powerful state would also be wonderful!

He changes his mind after about 10 minutes with said grandpadawan.

He wants the adult one back please. The 7 year old is dissecting his soul and telling him how pointless his life decisions have been :-(

Shit really hits the fan when baby!Obi-Wan accidentally bumps into Sheev.

Obi wan returns to adult form in a galaxy that sort of resembles this

He can’t do much complaining though considering it was him that caused this.