Art #1 For The Vaderkin Creative Exchange 2024! For @unlikecharlie; Thank You For The Prompt, I Really

A Tale of Three Antivirus Programs

Aka, I somehow have three different antivirus programs vying for the privilege of protecting my computer? My laptop: *fan running loudly nonstop because it's probably been... a month? since I last restarted it.* Me: Oh, you poor thing! *restarts it.* My antivirus software, next time I open my laptop: Hey, so we're going to need you to restart your device so we can install this new update. Me: Well, should have thought of this sooner, Bitdefender, because I literally just did that, and it is not happening again until things get buggy. See ya' next month. Note: Chances are that Bitdefender will do the same exact thing next time I restart. Even if I restart on a weekly basis instead of monthly, it does this. It's like anytime I decide to restart, it wants to update. Why. Bitdefender, when my laptop connects to wifi: This is your home network, yes? Me: No. Bitdefender next time the laptop connects to that same wifi: This is your work network, yes? Me: No. Bitdefender, third time connecting to that wifi: This is your home network, yes? Me: *facepalm*  why are you like this. Also Bitdefender: OMG you're on an unprotected network, turn on your VPN! The network: *is private, password-protected* The VPN: *is an extra, offered by Bitdefender, which I don't subscribe to* Me: *is suspicious that this is just a ploy to pull in more money* The OTHER antivirus software that my computer came with, and still hangs out occasionally, just to be a pest (yes, McAfee, looking at you): Hi!  Turn on web protection! Me: Are you seriously trying to get me to use two antivirus programs at once?  Do you really think that's a good idea?  Or even remotely necessary? The THIRD??? antivirus software, which my computer also came with:  *shyly knocks on the door, by which I mean pops up a humble little notification when I first turn the computer on*  Hey, would you... maybe... like to... consider turning on Microsoft Defender? Me: *wishes I could post a "No thanks" sticky note on my OS like I can on my front door* Go away. To be fair, I could probably uninstall the McAfee thing.  But at the same time, it's kind of funny having these three competing programs, even if what they're competing for seems to be the title of Most Irritating Hypervigilent Software.

Now playing: III-XII. Rude Awakenings

In which Ahsoka bids farewell to Shili, Vader proceeds with his plan to dechip the clones, and Piett puts one and one and one and one together and makes four.

Characters keep getting ideas and running with them.

So, uh, Piett and Starkiller... yeah, this was definitely not the plan when I first decided to include those characters in Fortune's Rule. (Heck, they weren't originally supposed to be in the fic at all, but then neither was at least half of the story that's happened thus far, so....)

They were supposed to have pretty separate parts in the story, and they were both going to be much more minor than they're turning out. Until Piett apparently decided Starkiller needs a friend. And he's definitely not wrong, so who am I to say no?

The unfortunate thing here is that now I'm going to have to figure out how the heck Vader is going to deal with the news that his admiral and his apprentice are in cahoots behind his back.

*looks sternly at characters*

Do you see how much extra work you are making for me? Now, behave!

(This seems to have become a recurring theme in the writing of this story. Ahsoka and Padmé weren't originally going to have as close a relationship as they do, but then they decided to take the reins for just one chapter, and look how that turned out.)

From a Certain Point of View

Or, how Ben Kenobi’s boldfaced lie prevarication saved the Galaxy (but not in the way he thought it would).

(See Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four)

Part Five: Epilogue

When Sidious dies, Jedi and other Force Sensitives across the galaxy sense it, even if they don’t all know precisely what it is that they’re feeling. The Force reverberates with the death of so powerful a being – with the shattering of so many significant shatterpoints. A heavy, oppressive cloud has lifted. The Force hasn’t felt this way since… longer than some of them even remember. The older among them do remember the days when the Force was lighter and their foresight clearer, but even they hadn’t realized how bad things had gotten until the fog of the Dark was gone.

Padme, with her low midichlorian count, is not particularly attuned to the Force, but she feels it too. Somewhere deep in her bones, she knows that something has changed. And Padme has always trusted her instincts.

So when Anakin bursts into her office in the Senate and announces that he just killed Chancellor Palpatine – oh, and that Palpatine was a Sith Lord who orchestrated the entire war, by the way – she isn’t quite as shocked as she probably should be.

(Which is not, of course, the same thing as not being shocked at all. Because Palpatine? A Sith Lord? She’d been concerned about the executive powers he was accruing and the policies he was putting into place, of course, but…)

“Are you all right?” he asks, dropping to his knees in front of her chair.

“Me?” she says. “I’m fine, Ani. I’m not the one who just fought a Sith! We need to get you to a medic.”

“Only if you get looked over too,” he says. He hesitates then adds, “Is there anything you, uh, wanted to tell me?”

He gestures awkwardly in her direction with his flesh hand.

Padme stares at him.

“I’m sorry?” she says, eyeing him worriedly.

Who knows what kind of damage he might have sustained in his encounter with Palpatine.

“You know,” he says. “Any, um, family news?”

“My family is fine, last I heard,” she says slowly. “Ani, what’s going on?”

He takes a deep breath.

“Padme, how is the baby doing?”

She stares at him. 

“What baby?”

There is a choking sound near the door.

…which, she realizes in retrospect, they never closed after Anakin barged in like a gundark. 

“An excellent question. Is there anything,” a particularly exhausted-looking Obi-Wan Kenobi says dryly, one eyebrow arched, “that the two of you would like to tell me?”

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More art for the Vaderkin Creative Exchange 2024!

From @sinvulkt ‘s prompt “Vader being kidnapped by someone, not happy at all and loudly complaining”

This was pretty fun, i wonder what kind of hijinks these four can get into on Sakaar >:)

Bonus:

Wonder how disappointed Rex would be to hear that the 501st is now called “Vader’s Fist”

From a Certain Point of View

Or, how Ben Kenobi’s boldfaced lie prevarication saved the Galaxy (but not in the way he thought it would).

Part One

Shortly before the beginning of ESB, Luke accidentally winds up in the past, conveniently appearing right next to Anakin Skywalker, new Jedi Knight. 

After convincing Anakin that he is indeed his son from the future – this takes a great deal of time and no small amount of effort – Luke begins to warn him about the Dreadful Future that awaits the galaxy… only to be returned to his own time/universe before he can finish the story.

But hey, Luke is sure that Anakin won’t have any problems figuring out the Emperor’s true identity. At least he was able to get across the important information, yeah? 

At least he got to warn his father about Darth Vader.

There’s just one little problem: Luke doesn’t know that Vader is the same person as Anakin Skywalker.

So when Luke warned his father that some student of Ben’s was going to go Dark Side, destroy the Jedi, betray and murder both Ben and Anakin himself, and probably kill Luke’s mother while he’s at it, Anakin drew the obvious conclusions:

#1: He (Anakin) is the only padawan Obi-Wan has ever had.

#2: If that Dreadful Future of his son’s is to come true, that obviously means that Obi-Wan is going to take on another padwan in the near future. 

#3: Therefore, in order to prevent the nightmare that is Luke’s world, all Anakin has to do is make sure that Obi-Wan never gets another padawan.

Easy, right? 

…Right?

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Would like to suggest an alternative ship name for the Obi-Wan and Satine thing:

Satobi

Now, I know, it's not the most aesthetically or aurally pleasing word, but if you say it quickly, it sounds like "sad Obi," and that's just so appropriate.

(Disclaimer: I don't know much about the whole ship-naming thing, so apologies if this breaks any rules of nomenclature, but it was a fun way to play with sounds and meanings.)

Been doing a little sketching to try out some new pens and markers!

I discovered that Pentel makes this cool pen called the Hybrid Technica, which has a ballpoint but uses flat black ink (like that used in Pigma Micron pens) instead of the typical, kinda shiny, oilier-looking ballpoint ink. It's fun, because I enjoy the feel of sketching with a ballpoint pen, but also like the look of the Micron ink!

Also tried out a larger Micron pen for a more graphic look, also fun. I'd only ever used the 005, 01, and 05 before, but decided to see what a 12 would be like, and it's a very different look!

My mom passed off some grey Copic Sketch markers to me, too, so I messed around with using those for shading.

"Luke and Leia have begun to find Tatooine a trifle boring...." This is the Pentel ballpoint, with Copic shading. Trying for a more Ernest Shepard-like style. I'd like to do a collection of several drawings of the twins for an upcoming chapter, all ink sketches like this, on a single piece of paper, depicting their escapades.

Also Pentel ballpoint. Supposed to be Katooni and her ysalamir, but I was working from very vague memory, so it's very inaccurate. As for the lovely little bit of FOILing... I have this habit of reaching for whatever paper is nearest when I need to jot something down. Old sketchbooks from high school? Random bits of algebra here and there. Journals from college? Snippets of biology research notes. It's kind of fun to flip back through years later, almost like a mini time capsule.

Micron 12 with Copic shading.

(Just one question. Why are they all looking off to the left???)

Now playing: II-XIX. Know Thine Enemy

The final chapter of Part II, in which Vader's hope and Ahsoka's fear are confirmed, and Padmé realises the truth about her Imperial contact.

Lately, I've been procrastinating writing a tricky bit of Fortunate's Rule wanting to draw a scene where Ahsoka has been knighted, and Anakin has taken on Starkiller as his second padawan.

This drawing began as a pencil sketch on a light day at work. (On printer paper. With a crappy eraser. It was painful.) And then I photographed the sketch, loaded the pic in Krita, and colored over it. Then found a Varykino pic to go off of for the background, since the trio seemed to require one.

I'm fairly happy with it! Really pleased with the shading on the clothes, and with Ahsoka's lekku in general. Shading Anakin's face was incredibly trying for some reason, however, and I'm not at all sure that he looks ~10 years older than in TCW.

Oh, and Krita has this cool impasto brush that made filling in the gravel on the patio so easy! There's also a nice sponge brush that made the water similarly simple.

(See below for OG sketch and pose reference credit.)

The OG sketch:

Based off of this pose reference that I found on Pinterest, by mellon_soup.