#(the bitter resentment is strong but the flesh is WEAK BITCH)

[tennessoui]

40 or 43 if you’re still taking prompts! i love ur AUs they’re so beautiful and contain so much brilliance within a short snippet!

it's been so long, anon, you probably forgot you sent this but here is prompt 40, exes meeting after not seeing each other for a long time. in true tennessoui fashion, they don't. actually. meet and/or see each other in this snippet. also in true tennessoui fashion, all tennessoui needs to decide to continue this is one (1) validation.

the backstory here is something i have been thinking about for days after a discord convo, where during the fight on mustafar, obi-wan hits anakin hard enough in the head that he loses all of his memories. obi-wan takes him with him for a few months but the wounds of Order 66 and vaderkin's role in what happened is too fresh for obi-wan to (understandably) get over, even if this anakin doesn't remember doing it, so they separate. this is set 8 years after Mustafar.

(1.7k)

“Kenobi won’t come,” the fighter pilot says immediately upon disembarking from his craft.

One commander lets out a groan. Someone else hits the durasteel side of the closest x-wing with a closed fist.

“Do we really need him?” Anakin demands, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s been eight years since the rise of the Empire. Surely a washed-up Jedi General from the Clone Wars won’t have people jumping to join the Rebellion!”

No one meets his eye. In fact, the air room suddenly feels very, very uncomfortable.

Organa exhales heavily and turns to look at Anakin, which is rare because the man never voluntarily looks at Anakin. “There are few names from that time that still carry an untainted weight in the eyes of the galaxy. Obi-Wan Kenobi is one of them.”

“I grew up hearing about The Team!” A teenager says eagerly. “I’d join any resistance movement if I knew both of ‘em were fighting with me!”

“You’re already a part of a resistance movement,” a girl next to him pointed out waspishly.

The boy waves her off. “Skywalker and Kenobi, saving the galaxy! It’d be wizard to be a part of that, and you know it, Aasha!”

Anakin’s throat tightens at that name. Skywalker. His name. Or, his old name. He has no more connection to it now than he does to the name Kenobi or Organa. They’re just letters.

He catches Organa’s eye. The man is looking at him with a mix of curiosity and wariness. Anakin knows instinctively that this is another one of the man’s tests. Will this time be the time that whatever injury has kept his memories suppressed for eight years is undone, and his previous life comes thundering through his mind?

He’s sick of these tests. He’s never failed one, but Organa never comes closer to trusting him afterward. He can only assume that whatever Anakin Skywalker had done in his last few days alive had been so terrible that only a few people knew the truth, and those who did would never forgive any version of him for it.

Organa certainly knew, though he had never shared that information with Anakin. And.

And Kenobi did as well. That was clear. They’d only been together for five standard months, sharing a small spacecraft made smaller by the fear, agony, grief, fury, and hurt radiating off of his companion into the space around them.

It had been hard to tell at the time if one of the things Obi-Wan Kenobi had been grieving was the loss of Anakin Skywalker. Anakin isn’t sure Kenobi would have been able to answer that either.

Some part of him that usually rests dormant in the back of his mind stirs and hisses that it had to have been. That Skywalker’s loss had torn Kenobi’s soul to shreds.

This doesn’t necessarily feel like his own thought, but it’s quite hard to ignore. He wants to rub a hand against his aching head, but that surely would tip off Organa that something’s--what? That he’s having thoughts?

Perish the very idea.

One would think Anakin hadn’t joined the Rebellion of his own free will. That Anakin hadn’t spent three standard months on the planet Kenobi had left him on before catching wind of the existence of the Rebel Alliance, that he hadn’t risked life and limb (more limb, apparently, given his missing flesh hand) to find them afterwards. He hadn’t known much anything about himself, but he had known that he hadn’t liked what the Imperial troops were doing, how much destruction they were causing, how the people they were supposed to be protecting hid in fear of their white armor.

Something in Anakin had rebelled at that, had thought it wrong and twisted. Someone needs to stop them, he’d thought. So he had found the people that were trying to.

And yes, a small part of him had thought--perhaps hoped--that Obi-Wan Kenobi would be a part of the Rebel Alliance by the time Anakin made his way to their biggest base. He had thought--perhaps hoped--that he would be able to prove himself to the other man. Look, he had wanted to scream at Kenobi, I’m not like that other Anakin, I would never do what he did. You can trust me. You can look me in the eye, I won’t stab you in the back.

Because something in him had yearned, still yearns, for Kenobi’s approval. For the weight of his gaze settling warmly around his shoulders. For his small smiles, his calloused hand clasping the back of Anakin’s head to bring their foreheads together in a gentle tap hello.

These are things Anakin knows he’s never experienced. But he must have in his past life, because his whole body will ache for them like a phantom limb. It’s been seven years and a few months since he last saw Kenobi.

“I’ll go,” Anakin says, which is what he said the last time they were standing like this, huddled around a fighter pilot delivering the same message of failure.

Organa’s mouth tightens in displeasure, and Mothma places a hand on his arm in warning.

Everyone else falls silent around them, as if recognizing the fact that they’re in the middle of a brewing storm, and they’re lucky to be in its eye right now.

“I do not think--” Organa starts, but Anakin cuts him off, crossing his arms even tighter over his chest, as if to hold himself back. The force suppression collar around his neck grows warmer, but it holds. It always holds.

“You’re already sending men who look like me to him!” Anakin points out irately. “The last four men could have been related to me!” It’s something Anakin’s thought about in the past but never said out loud. He’s glad to say it now though, especially because Organa flushes a bit which means Anakin’s right. “Just send me! If it doesn’t work, nothing in the galaxy will!”

Now, Anakin isn’t sure that’s true at all. He’s taking a huge leap with this, but it’s been seven years and a few months since he saw Obi-Wan Kenobi in person, and every part of him is aching with the desire to lay eyes on the man again. Will he hate him still? Will he see all the differences Anakin’s made to his appearance? Will he like them? He fights the urge to run a hand over his shorn hair.

Will Obi-Wan even let him through the door?

The people around them are murmuring now. They don’t know what Organa knows, what Anakin has guessed at: that Skywalker died a traitor to the Republic, that he had tried to strike down Obi-Wan like the Emperor struck down the rest of the Jedi. To them, these fortunate outsiders, they’re wondering why Anakin Skywalker hasn’t already been sent to locate and bring back their errant General.

Before, Anakin’s offer had been quiet, easily ignored over someone else’s. Now he’s loud and confident. Impossible to turn away without making a public scene, without explaining why. And Organa has tried very hard not to do that. For whatever reason, Anakin doesn’t know. All he knows is that after he’d been examined by a battalion of med droids and interrogated by all three leaders of the Rebellion, Organa had given him a list of rules he had to follow in order to join the Rebel Alliance. Firstly, never remove his cuffs and collar.

It’s not a slave collar and it won’t electrocute you if you touch it or try to take it off, Organa had told him when he’d blanched away at the sight. But I have been informed by a trusted ally that the Chance--the Emperor knows your Force Signature intimately. We cannot risk being found. It would kill all hope for us.

Secondly, never confirm his identity. Never talk about who he used to be.

People will know, Organa had grudgingly admitted. Skywalker was one of the faces of the Clone Wars. But you cannot confirm it. In fact.

Thirdly, give up the name Skywalker. Pick another last name, if not first as well.

But Anakin had been attached to his first name for some reason he didn’t know how to begin to question, so even after he toyed with the idea of changing it completely, he couldn’t go through with it. Weeks later he had shown up in Organa’s makeshift office.

I had a mother, didn’t I? He had asked, causing Organa to stiffen immediately.

Do you remember? Organa had interrogated immediately, his standard greeting for Anakin. Anakin had gotten the feeling, especially in those early days, that Organa was waiting with baited breath for Anakin to remember so he could try him for war crimes or treason or whatever it was that Skywalker had done.

No, he had responded honestly. Just a feeling. If I am to take a new last name, I want her name.

A few days later, Anakin had stumbled into his bunk, tired from a day of hard training, to see a packet of documents on his pillow.

Anakin Shmison was written at the top of the first page.

The list of rules goes on and on.

But nowhere does it say that Anakin Shmison isn’t allowed to mention Obi-Wan Kenobi in public. He just never has, because even the sound of the man’s name makes him feel very nauseous, a combination of butterflies and adder snakes wrestling around inside his stomach.

Bail Organa is looking like he’s regretting that oversight right now, but Anakin has backed him quite solidly into a proverbial corner. Either finally tell everyone what happened between Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi in the last few hours of the Republic, or give Anakin Shmison leave to retrieve Kenobi.

“Fine,” Organa gets out, jaw locked and vein throbbing in his temple. Anakin has the distinct feeling he’se spent a lot of his life on the receiving end of that expression. “Have this X-Wing refueled, and leave tonight.”

“No sir,” Anakin says, enjoying the way one of the man’s eyebrows shoot up in angry incredulity.

“No?” Organa asks. “Would you like more beauty rest, perhaps, Shmison?”

“No sir, I don’t need it,” this time he doesn’t resist running a hand through his hair, messing with its part so his longer bangs fall to one side and balance out the mysterious scar that bisects his eyebrow. He grins. “But I will need a craft that sits two. For the return trip.”

#asks #i had a scene planned out where x y z happens and obi-wan lets anakin into his hut/home #and anakin is just like look im a part of the rebellion now!! #and obi-wan 'i use my sarcasm to hide my infinite sadness' is like #'yes im sure the rebellion wouldnt exist without you' #because you know. technically it wouldn't. #but anakin doesnt really get that context so hes like 'stop speaking in tongues old man!!!' #and obi-wan says 'please do not call me that' in the wateriest most loosely strung together voice anakins ever heard #anyways whats happening with me that all im writing is angst #i love happy things and happy endings #obikin #(because they'd get together come on anakin probably has an undercut now and hes thirty obi-wans only a man) #(the bitter resentment is strong but the flesh is WEAK BITCH) #kit to kit: u dont need another wip u really cannot have another wip ur not strong enough for another wip u-- #prompt fill

[scripted-dalliances]

Rest In Peace: Chapter One

Title: Rest In Peace

Chapter: 1

Summary: A part of Faithless Fairy Tale, a more in depth look at how they brought Laura back to life. Appearance of old faces, creation of new ones and if you’re looking for canon, it left a long, long time ago. If you squint you might be able to see some pieces from the book.

A/n: This is less a labor of love and more like a violent attempt to get this beast of a story out of my head. I attempted to shave and shape it into something other people might be able to read and enjoy. Did I succeed? I honestly don’t know, this is what happens when I’m left to edit by myself. If it’s trash, I apologize. 

“All you need is someone to believe. Really believe. And maybe a new story, right? A reinvention. A rebirth.”  - Faithless Fairy Tale

+

Laura promises pretty things out of her wicked dead mouth, and to a degree he already believes them. Why wouldn't he, after watching her slay Grimnir with his own blade to save the likes of him?

Make no mistake, he's not deceived by her, he hasn't forgotten who she is. Mad Sweeney knows the mettle of Laura Moon, even minus the stolen war god’s blade and his lucky coin. He is not blinded by her one act of mercy to think she isn’t the same woman who crushed his balls in her palms like fucking walnuts.

Who huffed pesticide under hot tub tarps and crawled out of her own grave. 

He is not stupid.

She is a bitch, she is a crass little thing, but there isn't enough strength in his bones to deny she inspires him. To anger. To stand against the tide. To lower himself right down to her level; to tussle in the mud of blasphemies, insults and filth. Everything about her, pulls and demands something of him. Whether good or bad, whether it is her's by right or not, he hands it over.

(He does it with hard hands, with spite and bitterness. With love.)

The sirens of old could sing their pretty little hearts out, but it's only Laura's voice calling him a pussy that could drive him overboard. The reason unclear; to prove her wrong, to chase her, or just so he could drown himself and be done with her.

Not even he knows.

(So of course he agrees.) 

Mad Sweeney sighs deeply, a man condemned to be saved and hangs his head.

“Yeah, alright you mad bitch. Let's hear your theory.”

+

It takes work. Scratch that. It takes a whole fuck ton of work. Most of which starts with research, that Laura herself demands he be involved in.

The deal is this: She will pray to him, not the old fashion way mind you. With tiny offerings of milk and bread, sweetened by faith. Laura has grand plans, she'll write a book, she'll go on tours reading to kiddies and to anyone who listens.

She promises to sue General Mills for defamation of character if they let her.

She will do it until someone else proves to do it better, and then her part of the deal is done. Problem is she'll only do that if he helps brings her back to life in the first place. Properly this time, in her words. No half-assed plans or maybes.

(His part no surprise, is the difficult part)

Laura of course makes it even more complicated. Refuses to go into this blind, ignoring Mad Sweeney's advice that this will only slow them down. She needs faith, not answers to a bloody pop quiz.

Ostara does the best she can to help, giving them access to her many libraries filled to the brim with books on resurrection, from the gods that bestow it and several ones that involve the opposite. Nestled in many of them are testaments to her growing bitterness. Written in the margins with hot pink ink, little notes of what is a lie, what is a cop out and who took credit where none is due.

She is one of the kinder goddesses, there's more love in her heart than not, but the years of abandonment has made spite grow in her like weeds. Perhaps that's why she takes a liking to Laura's plight, she knows intimately what it's like to be buried and forgotten, to emerge from that grave and still stand. Maybe in the shadows instead of the light, but still there regardless.

Ostara does what many of the patrons of faith have done before, when the faith becomes dry and thin, she makes the best of it. After all, start asking for more than what is owed is what started a war, and she has seen what comes from that.

They all did.

Little Laura Moon, with a stolen blade and a heart made of stone. Who saw new gods and old, strong and weak alike and found them all lacking. It is in her, they have seen the true face of the faithless, the mortals who make or break them, and an end they can not escape.

Whether she knows it or not, Laura has become a judgment no god wishes to cross just yet, and that's perhaps another piece of the puzzle why Ostara gives them so much help. She never says as such, never says a single double-edge word to Laura or Sweeney, but still in rankles on him. The not knowing.

“This is more than what you owe me.” Sweeney tells Ostara, one afternoon when Laura has buried her head in some ancient tome -probably in a language she can't even understand- and isn't paying attention to him. It's not a secret that he's cashing in a favor from the goddess for just being here, but he feels like it's asking a lot. To lean on her good heart, her open doors and know that a storm will hit sooner or later.

(Grimnir might be dead, but the war is far from over. There are still the new gods, the old bitter ones and a whole bunch of fucking traps the old bastard set up in case of his end, that will have to be dealt with.)

“You stopped me from ruining what I loved most.” Ostara tells him, with a soft haunted look, “Too long I've been harboring this...resentment. We all have, but what for? The old days are just that. Old. Maybe I miss the power, but stealing spring is on par with a child throwing a tantrum for attention. That's not me.  So, maybe I'll work a different angle, maybe it won't work.” She shrugs her delicate shoulders. “Either way, I'm going to do it as myself. I'm going to honor all that belief, from the first believers that made me a goddess, who were the first to pray to my name, from those who kept true even when the rest of the world didn't. I can't turn my back on those chapters of my story. Otherwise, who am I?

He doesn't have an answer, it's too soon to be a bastard and remind her of all the fears that drove her to Odin's side in the first place. The weakness, the abandonment and death. Was she ready for that? Were any of them? This isn't a job, there's no step below god, either you are or you aren't, and then you're gone from this world.

Sweeney looks over at Laura Moon, with her moldy flesh, stitched together with cheap glue, bits of metal and string like some sort of bastardized dollar store version of Frankenstein. With all ten of her nails cracked and peeling, the heavy stench of her rot that floats with every breeze; makes even his iron stomach clench and roll, how it lingers as a constant reminder of her late state of decomposition. As if it wasn't obvious when she constantly had to pull maggots out of her ears, mouth and nose.

Maybe Ostara has the right frame of mind.

To keep true to yourself or accept a true end. 

There are worse things than death after all.

+

The weirdest part of all this, you know besides the slaying of Grimnir by a dead girl, of him playing fucking librarian and taking tea with the goddess of Spring while a storm builds; is watching Shadow Fucking Moon blush for Ostara.

It's so fucking weird that he can't even insult the bastard for it.

He'll just sit there silently, watching as the two canoodle -and there is no other words for it, because Shadow will be polite as a nun, and Ostara will just sit as close as she can with a beaming smile. They whisper and giggle like children do when they have a crush and Sweeney doesn't even know where to start with how fucked up any of this is.

It also is fucking awkward as shit for him, because it's not just him in the room when this happens. Laura is there too. Making it a test, a competition of strength of will between him and the bitch dead wife. Whoever had to leave the room first in disgust, lost. 

He lost every god damn time.

Whatever happened to her heart when Shadow failed to believe in her over Grimnir (just for a second, for one painful second, but to the dead that’s forever), has either frozen it or broke it. She doesn't mope or cry, thank Christ above, but she doesn't act jealous either. She is hell bent on other things. Like bringing herself to life.

And testing him with her stupid theories.

He hates it as much as he delights in it.

“Kiss me. Ginger minge.” She demands, hands on rotted hips and dull eyes looking up into his, with absolute venom even as she attempts to flutter her lashes and smile up at him. Shit, she just might actually spit acid at this point if he dared comment about how terrifying she looks.

“Fuck off, no.” He tells her. He doesn't have a point to prove, he just doesn't want to do it.

Not like this.

He drops the book he was not so secretly not reading, and childishly kicks at a pile near her in his attempt to get away. Moving to a different room to keep a stupidly long table between them. Not that it would do much good. She still has his strength, all his luck, and she all she has to do is get one hand on him and he's a dead man. Ha.

“You said you wanted to test my theory!” She screeches like a banshee at his retreating back.

“That was before I knew it was fuckin' batty!” He shouts right back. “That was before you started acting all sweet -horrifying by the way, thought your brain had literally rotted out of your fucking ears! Acting all delicate and soft, telling me to kiss you. Jesus fuckin' Christ, no woman! NO!”

Laura chases him around the awkwardly large dining table, and he won't deny he smiles a bit, when her hip catches a sharp corner and curses at him like it's his fault.  

“Well, excuse me for trying to be nice. I thought it would make this easier!”

“Well, you thought wrong, dead wife.”

It's at this, she snaps. Honest to god, snaps, and flings herself in his direction like a damned hellcat.

Sweeney attempts to run away, but she is small and quick, with hands like a fucking honey badger on crack. Her fingers claw into his shoulder, etching into the jean material like it was nothing but silk. Once she has him there, it's a losing battle, as she clings in with the rest of her body soon after.

They fight all the way down. He attempts to throw her off, but she digs her sharp knees into his ribs. Hard enough to bruise, right until she has him on his back, with her legs clutching down on his sides like steel clamps.

With no tenderness, her clammy hands are gripping his head, all the fingers braced to keep his skull still. Forcing him to look at her as she struggles to plant one on him.

“Let.Me.Kiss.You!” She growls, leaning in only to find him squirming more. She gets his nose, his beard and cheek, ghosting over each but never for long enough. “Are you going to turn into a fucking little toad or something? Christ, I am not asking for your virginity, princess. Just a damn kiss!”

Sweeney tilts his head, strains his neck and wiggles like a dying fish, calling her every name in the book and then some that aren't. He does it in English and Gaelic; all between his gritted teeth but none of it moves her. In the end she claws to keep his face down, digging her razor blade nails into the flesh of his cheeks until he screams.

“Fine! FUCK! I said fine, dead wife! DO IT!”

Laura releases her grip and glares down at him, gets close enough for him to gag slightly on the scent of death and decay that surrounds her -but she doesn't kiss him.

“First tell me why you are acting like such a prude over a single kiss.”

“Oh. Sweet mother of Christ above. Does it matter?”

Laura smirks, and proceeds to squeeze with her thighs around his middle. He screeches something foul, and is seconds away from feeling his guts burst like a fucking water balloon when she eases back. Planting her ass on his hips with no shame.

He will deny it until he is fucking blue in the face, but he likes her weight. Her strength. All wrapped up in a tiny package.

“Tell me or I will literally squeeze it out of you.”

“And they say romance is dead.”

Laura clenches, her face smug when a second later he is screaming once more.

(What he doesn’t know is that she likes when he screams, likes the way he bristles and burns, there is something beautiful in the way he strains so hard against her that the veins in his neck pop and pulse.)

“ALRIGHT YOU FUCKIN' MAD BITCH, I'LL SING. I'LL FUCKIN' SING. NOW STOP BEFORE I PISS MYSELF!”

Laura does, because ew.

Delighted in getting her way once more, she is content to wait for him to catch his breath. Merely tracking the beads of sweat on his brow and the way they trickle into his flaming red hair.

“…ah…fuck…” he pants. Licking his lips while looking away from her. Seemingly shutting his eyes in pain, more pain than he was mere seconds ago in. “I didn't want to kiss you…like this. With you making it all business and shady like, like it's a fuckin' handshake.”

“Oh.”

>

#rest in peace #madwife #mad wife #mad sweeney x laura moon #mad wife fic