#it really upsets me that the order did so little for the clones

[eelfuneral]

Are there any other Clone stans out there who hate the PT era Jedi Order? It seems like half the fandom sees it as this fantastic organization and I just…can’t relate.

The Clones’ story really resonates with me as a disabled viewer (I might explain why in another post), and the way that the Jedi failed them upsets me on a visceral level.

😭

#jedi critical #the clone wars #it really upsets me that the order did so little for the clones #and get praised for doing the bare minimum and being ‘nice’ #the ableism/sanism among some of the stans also soured my opinion

[dragonrider9905]

Infectious Love

Summery: After a failed, almost confession of love, you and Hunter's relationship is skating on thin ice...that is, until someone falls through (or gets stabbed in the gut), so to speak.

Warnings: Angst, lots of it, but comfort too. Lots of emotions. Mentions of blood and sickness.

Hellooooooooo @imaginesfordifferentfandoms tis I, your Secret Santa in the @cloneficgiftexchange!!!!! I really, really, hope you like it. I worked really hard on it ;D So I hope it turned out the way I imagined it in my head ;D Enjoy this kinda longish drabble XD Hehehehe now you understand all the questions I asked. I hope you don't mind I went with Hunter. You seemed to not mind any of them; he's my favorite so I know I can get carried away :D and I wanted to make sure the story was nice! Also, I gave Hunter's scarf a destiny. A fate. A sense of purpose. We now know what happened to it. I have spoken.

Furthermore, I'd like to throw a huge shout out to some people who deserve it. Firstly, @ghostofskywalker. Thank you so much for organizing this event and all the other ones like it. They are always so much fun and I enjoy them immensely. It is safe to say the others who join feel the same way. Thank you for all the hard work you put into it all! Also, thank you to @photogirl894 for being an awesome beta reader and supportive friend. I don't know if I would have finished this fic on time if she hadn't helped me through all the rough spots by her encouraging words. Bestie, you read everything but the ending...I hope you like it <3

The decree is written, now, let the story unfold.

“As a father, you couldn’t ask for a better place to raise a child.”

You’d heard Shep say these words to Hunter your first day on Pabu, and you had to admit, it made your heart flutter a little bit. You’d fallen hard for Hunter a long time ago but duty always got in the way. At first, you hadn’t realized just how much you cared for him during the Clone War, serving as their medic, until Hunter received a shot in the chest. It was then that you realized, or rather were honest with yourself, that your friendship was always more than just a friendship. Almost losing him gave you a clarity and an honesty with yourself that you needed, but that didn’t make things easy. In fact, they made them harder.

Because now you knew how YOU felt, but you had NO IDEA how he felt. Every day, you’d face a new challenge, a new battle, overcome insurmountable odds against the Separatists on top secret missions and won. Every night, you’d have a heart to heart with Hunter, talking about things that made him laugh, made you laugh, things that made you cry, or things that upset him. 

But never unburying that heavy secret locked away in your heart. 

You considered yourself brave in many aspects but not when it came to problems with the heart. You could tell Hunter anything and everything, except how you felt about him. Instead, you’d find little things every day to show him you loved him. You’d fix his caf the way he liked it, you’d make sure the others were considerate of his sense, you listened to him when he wanted to rant, you showed him you trusted him. You were his shoulder to lean on, his unofficial right hand man. Technically, Crosshair filled those shoes but not always. You tried to be the head of reason when the boys fought and patched them up when they were done arguing. 

Then the Clone War ended with fateful Order 66. Your world turned upside down and even though circumstances were different, your situation was the same. 

That secret would have to be pried out of your cold dead hands. 

You’d been on the run, constantly in fear for your lives and that of the child in your care. You’d started to love her as your own daughter, and you could see Hunter did too. You’d seen Hunter with Cut and Suu’s children before, but somehow, this was different. He’d cared for her as a father would. And that made your heart melt more than you ever thought it could. 

Now, here on Pabu, having something that resembled peace and a chance at a life, was it time? Could you actually have the dream you despaired of. The dream which was a nightly comfort but in the morning seemed unreachable as something you thought you couldn’t hope for? 

Shep’s words teased you. Taunted you. Pried at you. 

Perhaps, perhaps it was time to open your heart? 

“So have you reconsidered staying?”

“For soldiers, putting down roots is an occupational hazard.” 

“Is that all you are? Soldiers?”

You’d seen the thoughtful look on Hunter’s face. It was the one he made when he was considering something. There was no contention, just thoughtful pondering. 

Somehow, some way, that moment spurred you and you worked up the courage. 

Hunter sat in the cockpit, swirling his knife. You approached and leaned against the door. You’d love to sit there and watch that for hours. You smiled a little to yourself, waiting for him to recognize your presence so as to not scare him into a mistake (not that he’d ever but…better be safe than sorry.) 

“Echo said he’s on his way. Will be here in a few rotations.” he said without looking up. “Omega will be glad to see him.”

“Yeah, she misses him, the poor kid.”

Sheaving his knife, he turned to you. 

“So, what can I help you with?”

“Oh, you know, just checking in on my Sargeant. You’ve been in here all day.” You placed some fruit native to Pabu in front of him. You never could remember the name, but you’d noticed he liked them. 

“Thanks,” he gave half a smile while you took the seat next to him. “What kind of trouble are Wrecker and Omega getting into?”

“Ohhhh probably best not to know right now. Just enjoy the few moments of peace while you can.”

He chuckled and cut into the fruit.

“Soooooo” your heart pounded. You were actually going to do it. You got this…just had to breathe and remain steady, it’d be ok. 

Hunter gave you a side eye, silently offering you a piece of the fruit. Kriff, he can tell. You tried to slow your heart best you could. 

“So.” He prompted you.

You laughed. “I heard Shep the other day. Something about settling down…ever think about it?”

He sighed. “More than you know. I honestly don’t know what to do about it. I’d like to but… It’s … complicated.”

“Ever think about marrying a pretty woman and having a family? Raising Omega somewhere safe where she’d be happy…”

He huffed a little. 

“Who’d I marry? Please don’t suggest the woman Wrecker’s friend was trying to set me up with.” 

At the words, the muscles in your face felt heavy and turned sour. The twinkle in your eye went out and the joy in your demeanor dissolved. 

An empty smile remained on your face. No indication to the outsider that anything had changed. But Hunter wasn’t an outsider. He knew you inside and out. 

Who’d I marry? You weren’t even a consideration. You weren’t on the list. Of course you wouldn’t be. It’d be foolish for you to think that. Why’d you hope in the first place? You should have known better. 

Swallowing hard, you bit back tears and forced a laugh. 

You had Hunter’s full attention now. He sat up straight and leaned forward a bit. 

He immediately sensed the change of demeanor. Your heart rate plummeted but beat hard. Your focus was gone, staring into nothing. Even if it was just for a millisecond, he’d have noticed it, but it lasted longer than that. 

Your hollow laugh filled the cabin.   

He knew he messed up.

Hunter moved to speak again but it was too late. You’d gotten up and moved toward the door. 

“Well um, I should go check on Omega and Wrecker and see what they’re up to before they do too much damage. Yeah, yeah…”

The next moment you were out of the cabin and down the ramp without a second look behind you. 

Kriff. He had to fix this. 

He almost went after you. He almost made it out the ship, but an incoming transmission stopped him. This could be the one he was waiting for. He looked longingly out to where he saw you hugging yourself, making your way slowly across the shipyard, and went back inside the ship. 

Kark it all. This’d better be important, Echo.

Tech was gone. Omega was taken. Crosshair a prisoner. Echo abandoned them, again. It was just you, Wrecker and Hunter now. A ship once filled to bursting with life and light, warm with the love and laughter shared between its walls, was now cold with an emptiness, a magnanimous devoid maw that the ship had never known before. 

Tech was dead. Crosshair was gone. Omega was taken. 

He was lost. 

Hunter might as well have added you to the list of lost as well, because even though you were physically on the ship, you weren’t with him. You were distant. Gone. In every way possible other than physical. You’d done your best to keep Wrecker and himself together. You’d been the same insurmountable strength you’d always been for them to lean on. You were being the strong one for them because you knew they couldn’t right now. He was angry, frustrated, focused and lost all in one but didn’t know where to direct that energy. As always, you came through. You acted the same as how you did throughout the entire Clone War, except not. The actions were all there, but there was a lost life to it. 

A lost love. 

And it was his fault. 

Though you were strong, you weren’t invincible. 

During the day you’d serve them. Got them food, made sure they rested, used every resource imaginable to find the little lost loved one. You tried to make them laugh and smile if you could or focus on the task at hand. Completing small missions to get by was his bane, because all Hunter wanted to do was find Omega, but you brought him back to the present, reeled in his reckless side when it got to be too much. You kept track of the inventory and how and when to push on. 

But every night he’d hear you silently cry yourself to sleep. 

You’d go and comfort Wrecker, then you’d offer the best gesture you could to him to encourage him, then you’d retire to your bed, broken down by the day. Tired, exhausted, empty. 

He saw it. And he caused it. 

And he hated himself for it. 

He’d lost you in a hasty, foolish sentence. One he’d said without much forethought. One he said because he was afraid if he’d said too much, or given any indication of the deeper feelings he had for you, you’d have rejected him and he’d lose you entirely. He thought he could be your friend. You deserved so much more. So much more than himself and what he could offer. He’d wanted to stay your friend so that way, even though he couldn’t have you, you’d be happy. He’d make sure that whoever he was, the man you’d marry would give you all the love he couldn’t. 

Turns out he was wrong.  

You did return his feelings and he broke you.

He should have gone after you, but he didn’t. He thought he’d have time. He thought he could do it when you’d return to the ship and he could sit down with you uninterrupted but he was wrong, so wrong. Echo arrived and in moments, though he didn’t know it, his life turned upside down. When the mission was declared, his focus turned to that. 

He should have talked to you. He should have let you know how he felt. 

But the manner of your hurt shifted. You were no longer hurt, but cold. 

Perhaps you didn’t want him to love you anymore. He didn’t know what to do. So much was wrong. So much that shouldn’t have been, was now his reality. 

In truth, you DID deserve more than him. Perhaps this was for the best. This hurt would pass and you’d meet the one you were supposed to be with. You could get over this fancy for him and live an actual life with someone else. 

The thought made his stomach churn and threatened to vomit, but perhaps, that’s what was meant to be. 

After all, sometimes to love someone you had to let them go. And Omega, she needed him right now, fully focused on nothing else but finding her. 

It was late in the night watch, Hunter sat alone staring at the broken pair of goggles and a plush toy that belonged to the child of the ship. His child, not by blood but by choice. 

Taken from him in a cruel twist of fate. 

He closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair. Hunter wasn’t normally one for crying but he felt close to it now. He didn’t know what to do, but he knew Omega took priority over himself. He HAD to find her. Bring her home. Oh Force, what was Hemlock doing to her?

He felt his head start to pound and his brow furrowed. 

It hurt so much to love. This was love, wasn’t it? After all, what would he know? All he knew of it was what was in the novels and holofilms…

Something cold touched his head and he jumped in surprise. Opening his eyes, he found you had taken a few steps back surprised, with a blanket and an ice pack in hand. 

It didn’t go unnoticed you’d had the scent of fresh tears on your hands. 

“I’m sorry, I thought you were in one of your uncomfortable sleep cycles.” You offered gently. “You looked like you had a headache so I brought you this.” You shook the ice pack. 

Hunter sat up and rubbed his head. “I…can’t sleep.”

He looked down. It was so hard to keep your gaze. His throat tightened and tears sprung against his will. All he could do was sigh, long and heavy. 

Hunter was silent, not knowing what to say. He tried opening his mouth a few times but closed it at every attempt, frustrated. 

You slowly drew near him, considerate as you always were. Giving him a chance to stop you if he wanted or needed, but he didn’t. You crouched down in front of him and took his hands. 

A shock of surprise sprung his head up immediately and sent a shiver through his body. His brain registered your hands were cold and instinctively he moved to warm them, covering them completely with his own. But his mind was fully focused on your face. 

Your eyes glittered with unshed tears and your mouth had a half, crooked smile. A ghost of the one you’d had before. But there was something in your gaze he’d missed, he’d longed for. 

It was ‘that’ look. 

You hadn't looked at him like that in a long time. 

There was a warmth and a love aflame. A gentleness that hadn’t been there these long past few weeks.  

If eyes were truly the window to the soul, he’d seen that the embers were dying, but not gone. 

You squeezed his hand. 

“We’ll find her. I promise.” 

There was such a conviction in your voice, determination. A rawness that almost freighted him. A testament to the power you had. The power of your will and spirit. The power of your determination. One of the reasons he loved you so much. One of the elements in your looks that he yearned to see again after missing it for so long. 

He squeezed your hands. 

“Thank you for everything.” He swallowed hard, voice now scratchy and sore. 

You nodded and stood, pulling your hands from his. You placed the pack on his forehead and placed the blanket on him in two swift motions and made to go. You were fast, but not too fast for him. You’d tried to retreat, but Hunter jumped and grabbed your arms, centering you to himself. 

A surprised look crossed your face and he saw you searching him, wondering. 

“We need to talk.”

You looked away, tears starting to gather again, a breath catching in your throat wanting to break free. 

Hunter cupped your face with his hand and slowly, softly turned your gaze back to him. 

“Please.”

You nodded, but then looked away again. 

“Ok, but not now.” Your voice was heavy and empty. That void look entered your eyes, extinguishing the flame that was there before. 

“No, you should get some sleep, you look exhausted. You’re always looking after us. Tonight, take care of yourself, yeah?” He rubbed his thumb against your cheek, whipping away a tear that escaped. “Tomorrow.”

You nodded. “Tomorrow.”  

Lifting the blanket you’d brought for him, Hunter placed it over your shoulders with a reassuring squeeze then turned back to his chair, cradling the ice pack to his forehead. 

Tomorrow came, but started off all wrong. Emergency lights flashed and sirens blared. The Marauder made an emergency landing on the treacherous mountainous planet below. The hyperdrive malfunctioned and threw you out of hyperspace. It was a tumultuous, uncontrolled landing but Hunter managed with minimal damage to the exterior of the ship. The haul was a little banged up, but other than that, the smoking hyperdrive was the focus of your concern.

There was no Tech to fix the ship now. You were on your own.

“Do you think you can fix it?” Hunter looked at you worriedly. You’d helped Tech plenty of times in the past. You considered yourself pretty capable with all the training you received from him. 

Taking a look around, you carefully considered. 

“I think so, but it’s going to take time. This superficial stuff I’m not too worried about. We’ll have to make port somewhere soon anyway for supplies. We’re low on everything.” You’d been looking at the inventory the last few days and the lists were concerning. “I think we have enough credits to get by until we can do a job and earn more.” You rubbed your forehead. “I’ve been running numbers on how to keep ourselves sustained without needing to distract ourselves from our mission with a whole bunch of side missions anymore. I think it’ll work but you’re going to have to trust me. But I digress. I’ll patch up the hyperdrive which seems to be the main problem. I’ve got a weird feeling about this place, I don’t want to be here too long. Weather might not hold out for extensive repairs either.”

“Alright, we’ll discuss this when I get back. I’ll scout the area and see what we’re dealing with.” Hunter turned to leave, then paused. Half looking back he spoke: “And, I do. Trust you, I mean.” 

With that he put his helmet on and shouted to Wrecker. 

“Keep her safe. I’ll be right back.”

It’d been an hour. And Hunter wasn’t back. 

Whipping the sweat from your forehead you heaved a big breath.

“I think that’ll do it Wreck. Where’s Hunt?” 

Wrecker looked nervous. “Not back yet.” 

You looked at your wrist chrono and raised your eyebrows in surprise. Highly unusual.

“Ok, I’ll go look for him. Protect the ship.” 

“We should stay together.” Wrecker added quickly, “I’ll come with you.”

“I would like that too but at this moment that’s a luxury we can’t afford. We have to split up.”

Wrecker groaned. “Bad things ALWAYS happen when we split up.”

You softened and patted his shoulder comfortingly. 

“I know, big guy, I know. But the less we argue, the sooner we get Hunt back.”

Wrecker paused and nodded. “Ok.” He sighed and took his place by the ramp of the ship. “And…..it’s good to hear you call Hunter, Hunt again…”he trailed off uncertainly, “but it’s kinda making me scared. You think he’s….?” 

Your heart clenched in realization. You didn’t think how your hurt would shed and affect others. “Oh Wrecker….” You started but he stopped you. 

“Aw Doc, I am just worried about ya. You two always meshed together, you know? So when you didn’t, and now get soft again…” He shook his head. “Get Hunter back, and everything will be ok, yeah?”

“Yeah, it will. I promise.” You started off your sentence quaking but with every word you found your conviction. It was time to go. 

“I hope you two can work things out. I always liked it that way, ya know?”

You smiled, “Yeah I do actually, and I did too.”

“Well, do you think that … whatever happened…you two can fix it?”

Your smile faltered a little bit but Wrecker didn’t see that. Really, only Hunter would have been the one to notice.

“I’ll do my best.”

With one last nod to Wrecker, you set out.

You weren’t exceptional at tracking but Hunter taught you a thing or two. 

It was time to bring Hunter home.

Hunter skirted the edge of the cliff carefully. His foot set a few loose rocks tumbling into the unknown. Knife unsheathed and corned against the endless void beneath him, he glared at his enemy. Hunter met these villains almost as soon as he left the ship. It didn’t take him long to realize their harmful intentions and led them away from the ship, hoping to buy you as much time as he could to fix the ship. He’d taken out ten of these bandits already, but this one was of a higher status, he could tell by the large hat he wore and more expensive weapons he possessed. He’d be more of a challenge but that would only make it more fun. 

Hunter growled and lifted his knife in the ready. Blood and sweat dripped from his face from the few scratches and scrapes he had. 

He was prepared for anything.

“Get away from him!” An agonized voice filled with terror screamed. 

Your voice. 

Hunter’s heart dropped to his stomach and for the first time since the crash, terror entered his veins. He was prepared for everything, except that.

Garnishing your blade, you swiped the air to show the mysterious stranger you were serious. “Leave him alone!”

Hunter’s throat closed up. You didn’t have your blaster, and while still decent with the blade, you weren’t ready for this yet. He hadn’t finished your training. 

“Meshla, no!” 

Hunter reached out, distracted only for a moment but a moment is all it took. In the second he tried to get in between you and the enemy, a kick to his stomach sent Hunter over the side

“Hunter!” You screamed after him in terror. 

What you didn’t see was the flip he made or how he grappled onto the rock. If only you had the enhanced senses he did, you might have heard his hard breathing, the uneven sob, and the continuous prayer that somehow you could live long enough for him to get to you. 

His heart pounded. He wanted to call for you but that’d only make things worse for you. He grunted as silently as he could. He had to get to you. 

He heard your angry grunts, the slices of knives through the air, missing their marks. He heard you yelling unintelligibly and savagely. The man’s gleeful laughter. 

Your painful cry.

No

Those were some of the longest seconds of his life. What happened? He tried to climb faster but the rock was so slippery.

Watching Hunter get shot. Finding him shot again in the same place all this time later by Cad Bane, and now seeing Hunter tumble over the edge was more than you could handle. Anger like you’d never felt it bubbling all over you, tingling your fingers and guiding your blade’s every movement with hardened focus.

No, you couldn’t lose him like this. You wouldn’t. The man was quick, practiced. But you’d had a good teacher. Now wasn’t the time to doubt. Sure, you wished your blaster had survived the raid on Ord Mantel but there was nothing you could do about that except replace it when you made port.

You tumbled, dived, parried. This demon wouldn’t win. He made a hit on your arm and you cried out. The evil, smug smile he had was enough to refocus you instantly. Jumping for him unexpectedly, you caught him by surprise. You pushed your entire body against his in a close roll.

And your blade found a home in his heart. 

Breathing hard, it took you a moment to realize…you’d won. You defeated him! Hunter would be so proud.

Hunter!

Diving for the cliff, you slid toward the edge. 

“Hunter? Hunter!”

Hunter looked up at you, face hidden behind his visor but all the emotions were spilling from his mouth. “Are you ok? Mesh’la, what the karking hells?”

“Grab my hand!” Ignoring him, you reached down. “I’ll pull you up.” 

Hunter clasped your hand but you let out a cry of agony. Collapsing in a heaping pile. You were shaking but your grip held firm.

“Mesh’la…” 

“Don’t you dare let go. Don’t you dare.” Your demand was dry and forceful, but fear spilled from every word. “Please.” Your plea was soft, broken.

“Alright.” He tightened his grip.

Tears streamed down your face as you panted, hulling him up. Hunter seemed so heavy. You’d done exercises like this before and it was a lot easier. Hunter seemed to notice your lack of strength too.

You pulled and heaved and scooted and rolled until you managed to get his body over the lump. Immediately, Hunter started his barrage on you in between heaving breaths of his own.

“What were you thinking? Don’t you know you could have gotten yourself killed?”

You got to your feet and brushed yourself off, head dizzy with emotion and adrenaline.

“Do you,” you panted, “have any idea what you did to me? Don’t start with me…”

“Oh honey, just wait until I get started—“ 

You turned to look at Hunter who also had gotten to his feet, the words registering, but sounding quite distant. Was he yelling? You weren't sure. Suddenly, your breath was knocked from your lungs and a sharp pain invaded your entire body. 

Falling to your knees, you clutched your side to find it wet and sticky, and warm. You didn't need to pull your hand away to look at it to know there was blood, yet that's what you did, and you were shocked nevertheless to find the red, sticky substance on your hands. Gasping with wide eyes, you missed Hunter’s cry of alarm.  

“You’re bleeding!”

Hunter ran over to you and caught you as you crumpled to the ground in pain. Gathering you to himself, he rested your body against his.

Tearing off his scarf from around his neck, Hunter pressed it to your wound.

“You’re losing so much blood.”

“Nah, I know exactly where it is. Here, there, and a little over there.”

“Not funny.”

“I thought it was.” you faintly chuckled. 

With a dark look, he cut the red fabric into strips and bound your abdomen tightly. 

“I’ll get you back to the ship as soon as I can, just hold on for me ok?” 

You nodded but your eyes now felt so heavy. You just wanted to sleep. 

Scooping you up, Hunter started at a full run. 

The bouncing hurt. Every pounding bounce sent fire mixed with ice through your body. Your head rolled back and your eyes shut.

“Hey, hey, cyare, look at me. Look at me! Don’t give up on me yet, please.” 

Hunter came in running. 

“Wrecker! Wrecker! Get the ship started, we’re leaving NOW!”

Wrecker didn’t miss a beat. He saw you dangling limpless in Hunter’s arms and dashed up the walkway. Wrecker tore through the room, doing the start up sequences as fast as he could then meeting Hunter in the gangway, he threw the med kit at him. 

Back in the cockpit, Wrecker took the controls. 

Placing you in his bed, Hunter slapped your face.

“I know you’re in there, wake up! Wake up! Don’t leave me now, I need you. I can’t do this without you. Omega is depending on you. You’re stronger than this, come on!”

Injecting you quickly with a stim and re-wrapping your wounds, Hunter frantically chaffed your wrists until your eyes fluttered open. 

“Hunter?” You were looking around, trying to sit up. 

“Hey, hey don’t get up.” He placed a hand on your forehead, then your pulse points. He felt you slowly but surely starting to equalize. “Just rest for a bit, ok? I’m going to stay right here if you need anything.” He pulled up a chair next to you. 

“I’m ok,” you smiled weakly, “I was so scared when I saw those tracks. I thought I’d lost you again. But you’re ok, and that’s all that matters to me.” You squeezed his hand, then let the darkness take you.

All was still and dark. The Marauder gently rocked in what would pass for the early hours of the morning, if there really could be a morning or night in space. 

All was still and quiet inside the Marauder. Wrecker was by the controls watching the ship’s course and motion beacons, Hunter was fast asleep, leaned over the bed and holding your hand. 

You on the other hand were restless. Buckets of sweat fell from your forehead. Dizzy and disoriented, even laying down, a nauseous feeling crept up your stomach into your throat. 

You wormed your hand out of Hunters, not wanting to wake him. It’d been too long since he’d gotten any sleep at all and at last the complete and utter exhaustion took him over. You pushed on the bed, attempting and failing to drag yourself up. 

You glanced at Hunter, considering only for a moment, then resurfaced your determination. No, you’d let him rest. You could do this. Grasping the blanket’s cocooning you, you attempted to untangle the heavy sheet entwining you. It was so heavy, suffocating. 

With a heaving breath, you pushed your feet off the bed and lunged your body forward.

You were standing. 

But as soon as you got up, you realized your mistake. The ship spun and the dull aches over your body were awakened. Your stomach’s pain blew its trumpet and your ears felt like balloons that were going to pop. You must have swallowed marbles because there was barely any room in your throat. 

Oh well, you could only push forward. 

Stumbling into the bathroom, you turned on the cold water. Perhaps that would help. 

The first thing Hunter noticed was his hand was cold and clammy. The lack of warmth left a devoid and empty feeling embedded with a nervous foreboding. 

Next came the darkness, which became a haze, and that haze turned into a bubble as he fought he was to consciousness. The bed in front of him was empty and Hunter could vaguely make out the things around him, noises indecipherable. He thought he heard trudging of feet scraping against the floor, the turning of a facet with the gush of water, then a loud crash, and thud with a BAM!

Instantly his body was alert. Dashing toward the source of the sound, he knew subconsciously what he’d find. Your body on the floor, sprawled out and drained. Your face was pale as death, eyes hollow. You didn’t look like this a few hours ago? 

“Mesh’la? mesh’la! what happened? Did you hit your head? Why are you up?” A thousand questions spilled from his mouth in worry. 

Worming his body behind yours, he gathered you up gently. You mumbled something that was lost even to his hearing. 

Concerned, Hunter removed his gloves, and placed them on your face. 

You leaned into his warmth, shivering, unable to get warm, yet your skin felt like fire to him. You were burning. Beads of sweat danced on your forehead as large as the tears that fell from your eyes.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” Cradling you now, he carefully wrapped himself around your body. This allowed you to curl in on yourself and tuck yourself in further to his chest.

“‘M sry.”

Kriff, you could barely speak. 

“Don’t be sorry. I got you now.”

“Hunter, I-I can’t hear you too well.”

A wall of realization hit him hard. Kark it, he knew what happened. 

The fever, the swelling, the loss of balance and your voice, not to mention your hearing? 

You had an infection. 

Fear invaded Hunter’s senses. He’d never been sick like this, having super immune genetics (one thing to thank the long necks for he supposed). But now, how could he help if he didn’t know what you were going through exactly? 

This wasn’t the first time you were sick like this. He remembered the story you told of your childhood, and how one winter, you fell through the ice which resulted in something like this. The incident left you vulnerable and weakened, and he worried about you. 

You were tough and fought it out. But what if you couldn’t fight this one off? Would your second brush with death be enough to claim you?

Tears swelled your eyes and poured onto your cheeks. Small sobs started to wrack your body as emotion overtook you.

“I…sorry…don’t burnden…’Mega, gotta find…” 

“Hey, hey, it’s ok, I got you, I got you. You’re not a burden. We’ll get you better then we’ll find her. Hey, I got you, it’s ok.” Hunter had no idea how he managed to sound so calm. He’d never seen you like this before and it terrified him. Your small sniffles and hiccups reminded him of a small child. Every nerve and essence of his being screamed at him to protect you. 

“I’ll get you some water, I’ll be back. You have to stay hydrated.”

“Stay, I’ll get it.”

Hunter looked up to find Wrecker looking down at the two of you with a sad look in his eyes. “You should be with her.” He disappeared then returned a few minutes later with a full flask of cold water. 

Hunter brought it to your lips, but you barely swallowed any before relinquishing your strength to an empty sleep, exhausted by the struggle. 

Silence bore down on the three of you as Hunter and Wrecker looked on while you slept an uncomfortable sleep.

“I knew we should have stuck together.” Wrecker said sadly at last, not looking at Hunter. “I told her I’d come with her…”

“It’s not your fault, Wreck.”

“Bad things happen when we split up, I told her that….”

“This is all my fault.” Hunter hung his head. “I—”

“That kind of talk isn’t going to help her, Hunt. Don’t even think that. She made up her own mind. She was scared for ya, Hunt. She even started calling you ‘Hunt’ again.”

Hunter looked up surprised, then back down towards you. You’d stopped that since that morning on Pabu. You’d been formal with him afterward. It was either Sargeant or Hunter. 

He shifted then lifted you in his arms, bringing you back to the bed. He set you down then ran his fingers through your damp hair, worry evident in his eyes. 

“We need to get her to a hospital, Wreck. I don’t know what to do…Without Tech…I’m really scared right now.”

Wrecker placed a large, comforting hand on Hunter’s shoulder. “Then we go. We’ll get her better, Hunt. Don’t worry. I think we have a few of those fake IDs left Tech made. We’ll make something work.”

Swallowing hard, Hunter nodded.

Instead of letting go, Wrecker’s grip tightened. In one swift motion, Hunter was enveloped in a hug. If he was being honest, he didn’t mind in the least. 

Hunter sat by you in silence as the ship flew through hyperspace toward the hospital, watching your fitful sleep. Your forehead was creased in pain and your mouth turned into a pout. One hand carefully stroked your sweat soaked hair, the other intertwined with yours.

The waiting was the worst part. Not being able to do anything to help or accept, fate could only take its course and he could only stand by and watch. The worst enemies were the ones he couldn’t protect you from and he hated that. He couldn’t fight the infection with his blade, or take away your pain by shooting the cause with a blaster bolt. 

He leaned his forehead against yours and swallowed a sigh. Was this agony what you'd felt when he'd been shot? He remembered what delicate care you took of him. You'd been more than thoughtful, and tried not to show your concerns but he saw them anyway; just as he could always see you. But there was something else there that at the time he hadn't realized. And now he hoped he hadn't realized it too late. 

“You asked me before if I’d settle down like Shep asked……………and in my dreams, yes. I always wanted to, even before he asked, with you. It was you, it was always and only you.”

Silence was your response. 

 “Please, don’t leave me now. I already lost the others, I can’t lose you too.”

The steady rhythm of your heart was promise enough for him right now, he had to hold onto hope. 

“We can take it slow. Take our time. We don’t have to rush into anything but please, please stay with me and I’ll be yours for the rest of our lives. That’s my promise to you. I–I love you. Always have, always will.”

Perhaps if he’d hadn’t been so tired, he would have noticed the slight squeeze of his hand you have him. 

Hunter walked into the hospital carrying you wearing civilian clothing hoping he looked more inconspicuous than he felt. He approached the nurse at the front desk. 

“Excuse me, my wife needs help. She had an accident…”

“Chain codes.” the nurse said flatly without looking up but holding out her hand. 

Hunter fished them out and gave them to her. 

“It’s urgent, she needs to see a doctor ri–”

“Just sit down over there and the nurse will be with you shortly.”

“But she needs a doctor NOW!”

The nurse glanced up annoyed. 

“Keep that up and she’ll have to wait a full rotation, buddy.”

Hunter glared but didn’t say a word. Normally he would have fought back harder but with your life on the line, he couldn’t find it in himself to do it. So he did as he was bid, and took a seat in the waiting area. 

You blinked your eyes open with a smile. 

“Hey Handsome.” 

You reached up for his face, and he took your hand in his and gave it a quick kiss. 

“Hey,” Hunter kept his voice low, giving you a quick smile before making a quick survey of the area, “to catch you up real quick, we’re married. You’re my wife and we took you here after an accident on our farm. You’re going to be ok, ok?” 

His eyes darted across your face, looking, searching, for any indication that his words would come true. Even here and now on the brink of being saved, he felt like you’d suddenly vanish and be taken from him. 

He didn’t know what he expected from you, a nod of recognition maybe? But he didn’t get that. Instead, you chuckled. 

“Married? Already? So much for wanting to take it slow, Hunter.” 

To his surprise, a laugh burst from his lips, a smile replacing the worry for a second. He shook his head. Even now, you were trying to look out for him, making him laugh while you were the one who needed help. 

“Always looking out for me, aren’t you?” His voice was warm and full. The deepness of his voice like chocolate on your sore ears, not that he’d know that of course. All he could hope for was that you could hear the depth of love and gratitude he had in such a few words. 

You smiled, “always have, always will, I promise you that.” 

Hunter heard the nurse approach and looked up, only to be faced with a jaw dropping phenomenon. 

“How can I help you today? Wait…Hunter?”

It was Nala, your old classmate.

“Nala?” Hunter repeated, stunned. “You work here?”

“Yes…” her eyes drifted down to you. 

An unsettled feeling came over Hunter. You hadn’t been in touch with anyone since Order 66. Whose side was Nala on?

He didn’t have to wonder long when her face went white and she dropped down on one knee to be at your level. 

“What do you need? Let me assess her and see what I can do.”

Nala came running up carrying various vials and all but shoved them in Hunter’s pockets. 

“Give her this as soon as possible. It’s safer for all of you if you just take it and administer it on your ship. I got word of Imperials coming here shortly. I’ve listed instructions on how to give it to her safely. You should go before someone recognizes you and hands you over. Goodbye, and good luck. Take good care of my friend. When she gets better, tell her to give me a call!”

With that, Nala turned and left, trying her hardest not to give an impression of concern. 

Back on the ship, Hunter did as instructed. After making sure you were carefully placed in bed and made as comfortable as possible, he enlisted Wrecker’s help as soon as they’d jumped to hyperspace. Hunter knew Wrecker wasn’t going to like it, but there wasn’t another way. 

You’ll want to give this one to her first. It’ll regulate her body so she can take the following medications. It’ll help her breathe easier and adjust to what’s coming…it won’t appear so right away so don’t worry. You’re going to need to give this to her in quick succession so don’t wait to see the effects.

Hunter injected the hypo into your arm. 

This one is the IV with the antibiotics. Get her hooked up quickly and make sure the bag is drained before you take it out. 

He rubbed your arm and inserted the needle.

This one, inject into her chest near her heart. This one will hurt the most. 

This one, he couldn’t do. 

“This…is going to hurt.”

“I know.” You stared at the ceiling, trying to catch your breath and collect your courage. “It’s ok.”

Of course you knew, you were a medic. He would have cringed at his own words, but he couldn’t help it. His own fear mocked him and he wasn’t ashamed of it. Pain was pain, and nothing could make him like it or want that for you. All he could do was prepare you in any way he could. 

Your breathing was labored, huffing your breaths, greedy for air, gluttonously swallowing in as much as your lungs would let you. 

“Tell me.” You looked into his eyes, trying to focus, “tell me about it? I can’t seem to remember anything from our big day. What happened? Who was there? How did it go….How did I look?” You huffed a little laugh at the last question, “nevermind, don’t answer that.” Your laugh caused a coughing fit to follow. 

Hunter gripped you firmer as your body racked, fear unmasked in his eyes. 

Shutting your own, you tried to center yourself. 

“Crosshair probably made trouble, didn't he. He and Wreck competed to see who could eat the most cake and got sick, right?” Your voice was nothing other than a whisper, but Hunter could still pick up the dream-like tilt in your voice. The little smile as if it was a real memory, breaking across your lips. 

“Of course, would you expect anything less?”

Another chuckle turned into a gasp of air. 

Hunter kept his gaze on you as he spoke, his hand on your cheek facing him so you wouldn’t have to see what was to come. Rubbing gentle circles in your cheek and wiping away tears, he tried to speak without a shake in his voice. He didn’t know if he succeeded, but ever after that, he’d remember the images burned in his mind both, of the story he was telling and the raw reality of your pain. 

“Tech filmed the entire thing; we’ll have to rewatch it; would you believe Echo had more champagne to drink than anyone? He was so happy the entire night. He was also the only one next to Wrecker to cry.”

You smiled through gritted teeth.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You looked beautiful all dressed in white…” he stumbled over his words now as Wrecker garnished the needle, “your dress dazzled with little jewel thingies and you liked spinning in it because it reminded you of a waterfall or a butterfly’s wing. I couldn’t keep my eyes off you. And when you walked toward me, I was a mess, because I knew I was the luckiest man in the world, and I couldn’t ever have imagined you more beautiful.”

You swallowed hard. 

“Omega couldn’t stop smiling or singing; and when the music at the Pabu sunsets starts and the orange sun starts setting in the sky, it hit you just right and…”

You screamed as muffled of a scream as you could, but it rang in Hunter’s head so loud it bounced around until he felt like he was going to be sick.  

“Aaand, and, when the sun set, we resaid our vows under the stars, just you and me. Always, just you and me. I’ve got you, it’s ok.”

Your eyes rolled back and all went dark.

Breathing never felt so sweet. You smiled, feeling like you could laugh and cry at the same time. The pain was gone and you felt great! Energy was surging, and life felt beautiful again. Despite the illness, you remembered everything that happened with vivid accuracy. Though your eyes were closed, your mind was very awake and registered everything in perfect memory.

Not just the pain, but the sweet moments too. Hunter taking such good care of you, his poor fear and concern, the thoughts he confessed because he thought you couldn't hear.

You felt the urge to stretch but couldn't move. Opening your eyes and looking around, the sight made your heart melt. Hunter was curled up half beside and half behind you. His body was curled in around yours, holding you as if he feared when he woke, you wouldn't be there. 

Your heart was gripped by the softness of the gesture and you didn't want it to end.

You reached your hand up, running your fingers down his face and neck. The touch was enough to wake him. He stirred, then jolted with realization.

“You're awake!!!” Tears gathered in his eyes as he cupped your face with both his hands. “You're ok.” He smiled and swallowed so hard you could hear it. You embraced him, burying your face in his neck.

“I love you.” 

You froze. You didn't expect him to actually confess to you while you were awake. Hunter sensed your hesitancy and started to pull away, but before he could move an inch, you were grabbing him toward yourself again. 

“I love you, too. So much.”

“Can…we talk? I can't wait anymore.”

“Of course.”

Hunter turned shy. He found his hands extremely interesting as he fiddled with the blanket rim. His face turned red and he tripped over his words.

“I only said what I did because besides you….I wouldn't want to marry any other woman. Who would I even marry…if it wasn't you?”

He paused briefly before continuing.

“I always felt like you deserved way better than me…I can't offer you anything but myself and that's not much of a gift.”

“Hunter! No! You—” 

He gave you a sheepish look and cut you off.

“And I'm so sorry for everything that happened, for how I hurt you. I should have gone to you sooner, I should have…”

Now it was your turn to cut him off, but instead of with words, you captured his mouth with yours in a kiss 

You felt his shock, which made you smile, and soon he joined and returned your soft show of love, holding you even closer than before.

“You scared me.” Hunter said, kisses becoming needier. 

“You scared me first!” You countered, meeting his veracity. “More than once!”

When you both stopped for breath, you settled back in his embrace. 

“Hunter, you're all I could ever need or want. The gift of yourself is more precious than anything or anyone in the galaxy, and that's more than I deserve. All I've ever wanted was the war to end so we could have a family of our own, your brothers all be near us if they're not with us while we raise Omega and children of our own.”

Hunter's face darkened. 

“I wasn't strong enough to protect you or keep this family together. I lost Omega.”

“You didn't lose her, Hunter. She made a choice. She didn't want to lose you, and neither did I. You don't control the galaxy or have some responsibility for everything that happens. It's ok to breathe, Hunt, and let go. All we can do is move onward and face the galaxy together, just like we always do.”

Hunter nodded, the shadow slowly falling from his face, replaced with something gentler. 

“And that story I told before, about you in the white dress?”

“Yeah?” You blushed sheepishly, recalling with a bubbling laugh trapped inside your chest. 

“What do you say we make that real?” Leaning closer, he whispered in your ear, “I want to see you all in white, for real. I want to be yours, only yours, forever. I want to have a family, with you and only you. My brothers can all live close by and we can all be together. We can raise Omega the way she deserves to be raised…and I can love you, the way you deserve to be loved.”

“Yes! Oh yes! My sergeant, I am yours and only yours, now and forever!”

Filled with new determination, you smiled even wider, gripped his hand and got out of bed.

“Come on, now, love, let's go get our kid. Time to bring our family home. Time to start healing and growing.”

"The Empire be warned, we're coming."

Dividers by @stars-n-spice @ve-ti-ver and @djarrex

#I gave Hunter's scarf a fate #We now know what happened to it #It deserved a story #Hunter's scarf is important and we recognize that here #sergeant hunter x you #hunter x you #hunter x reader #hunter #the bad batch #tbb hunter #star wars #tbb wrecker #tbb crosshair #tbb tech #tbb omega #tbb echo #star wars the bad batch #clone fic gift exchange #TBBE24

[pinejayy]

Hi! Can I request the hantengu clones x reader who is a couple inches taller than them? Because it's canon their like 5'5 (short kings)

I might send in another request later if I feel like it so I hope you don't get annoyed with that.

Have a great day/night and please take your time with this request! :)

sure thing!! sorry about the wait. i've been busy and i've also been drained with this arizona heat. uwu and oof i'm like 4'11, the clones would treat me like a stepping stool

Hantengu Clones x Taller Reader

Sekido

Oh boy he would be pisssed about your height difference, like how is a human taller than him! It's not fair! And of course you're gonna tease the heck out of him and he's going to get very upset. As you guys were hanging out in your home he was yelling at the clones as always.

As you walked out the three clones had their heads down, you couldn't help but sigh and roll your eyes. "YOU GUYS NEVER LISTEN TO ME! I'M YOUR LEADER AND YOU SHOULD FOLLOW ORDERS!"

As you walked towards them, you rest your arm on his head. And he stopped talking for a moment before looking at you, he had a scowl. "What are you doing Y/N?" He growled softly.

"Nothing, just wanna know why you're yelling this time." You say, as you pinch his cheek slightly. And this made him even more upset, and he slapped your hand away. "Aw is the little guy mad?"

He looked at you, and his head snapped towards the other clones. "Leave...go away, go find us some food, and bring Y/N some food too."

"But! We can't go without you!" Aizetsu would say softly, making Sekido growl quite loud.

"I don't care you fuckhead, go.." He hissed, and soon after the three Demons would leave you two alone. You just stood there with a smirk on your face. And within a split second you were pinned against the wall. He growled. "Why are you always mocking me for my height, do you find it funny?" He said, holding onto you.

"Very much!" You say with a smile. He then chuckled. He looked at you, as you look down at your boyfriend you always enjoyed teasing him because you always got a good punishment from him.

"Oh is that so? You like mocking me huh?" He whispers, soon after he forced you onto your knees. "Now look whose the short one now..." He said, gripping your hair hair harshly. "Now be a good human and make it up to me." He whisper softly, as you were on your knees. Smirking as you look up at him. "Yes sir."

Karaku

He would honestly be very jealous, he gets embarrassed from your teasing. And his brothers would laugh at him whenever you mocked him but they would be silenced within a few seconds because you also remind them of their height too. Currently you were with Karaku in your room the clones were getting ready to leave for a mission.

But of course you wanted to tease your boyfriend would leave so you held onto his leaf fan. And he was looking it for everywhere and the other clones were waiting for him and Sekido was getting really impatient. "HURRY UP WILL YOU! WE DON'T HAVE ALL NIGHT!" He yelled out throughout the house.

Making you giggle, as you saw him looking for it. "Hey Honey." You cooed out softly, holding onto the fan behind you.

"Not now Y/N, can't you see I'm busy." He said, poor demon was stressed out. "Where did I leave it?"

"Oh you mean this?" You say, and held his fan out in front of him. Making him jump and run towards you and he was about to grab his fan but you held your arm up, making him frown at your action. "Aw are you upset? Do you need this?"

"Yes please, Sekido is up my ass. Please sweetheart." He begged, as he tried to reach for the fan but couldn't get it. Making you laugh as you shook your head. He then smirked, he leaned in and placed a kiss on your nose and he began to tickle you. And once you were laughing and once you started to squirm around he quickly grabbed his fan and ran out the door.

But before he could leave he yelled out throughout the house. "Be ready when I come back. I'll show you something long."

Aizetsu

He would want to be treated like a baby honestly like he loves your height difference, he loves how tall you are. But he still has his strength so he has the going for him. You don't tease him too much because one time you mocked him a little to harsh about your height difference and the blued eyed demon cried. But at the moment you guys were enjoying some alone.

Aizetsu was crying at the moment as you held him, and with you being taller than him he always wanted to be the little spoon, he loves the feeling of your arms wrapped around his body.

You rubbed his back as he cried softly. "I don't understand why my brothers are so mean to me.." He sobbed softly. You frowned, you honestly hated how they treated him. "It's okay my Love, the others are just upset because they don't have that special someone."

He looked at you and you smile weakly, wiping away his tears. "Shh don't cry, look since they aren't here why don't we do something to piss them off." You say and he looked at you confused but he just nodded. Making you smile, you grab his hand and ran out of your room.

You decided to grab their favorite things and put it on highest shelf of the house, and Aiztsu couldn't but but giggle. His brothers were gonna be upset. As you were done doing your thing he walked up to you and hugged you tight. You smile and hug back putting your head on top of his head. "I love you Y/N."

"I love you too love."

And within a few hours you guys were holding each other and you could hear the other clones yelling at each other. "Come on Urogi use your wings to help us get our things!" and you also heard. "Now fuck you guys. Get your things on your own."

Urogi

He would be the one who wouldn't give a fuck. Like he has wings he can literally "make himself taller" with them. Like you could be teasing him and he'll just flap his wings slightly and make himself taller than you, but by only a few inches. But you still mock him and are always telling him he can't do that.

But as for the moment you guys were walking around the woods, the moon was pretty tonight. As you guys walked you couldn't help but look at him, smirking at the Demon. You felt like pushing his buttons today.

"So how's the weather down there." You teased him as you kept walking, and he looked at you and stopped walking. He just kept staring at you as you walked. You were giggling to yourself, and as you walked you didn't notice that he wasn't by your side.

"I should ask you the same thing too sweetheart." He said, appearing in front of you. You look at him, and he was flapping his wings slightly so he could be taller.

"Hey that's cheating! You can't do that." You say, and stop to look at him which made laugh. He kept on flying as he looked down at you. "Just accept that I'm taller than you."

"NUH UUUUH!" He said, shaking his finger in front of you. Making you turn red. You look away and crossed your arms over your chest. You were puffing up your cheeks making him laugh even more.

"Aw baby! Don't be like that!" He said, as he leaned in close and placed a kiss on your forehead. And with that he stopped flying and placed his feet on the floor.

You gave him the side eye and pout. "I'm taller than you." You whine out making him sigh in defeat. "Fine you are."

Making you giggle and hugging him. "Yay!"

#hantengu x reader #hantengu clones #hantengu #x reader #reader insert #sekido #karaku #aizetsu #urogi #demon slayer x reader #kny x reader #kny

[masterjedilenawrites]

Take Me Out

Bad Batch x Reader Exchange 2024

Crosshair x fem!reader | 4.7k words

Content: drinking, light angst, introspection, fluff, light humor, crushes, relationships, friendship, mentions of war and death, weapons (practice setting)

Prompts: "What am I even looking for?" - "I don't know" & "Sometimes I think some work on your communication skills wouldn't be such a bad idea."

My gift is for the event host - @ghostofskywalker! I was so excited to draw your name and I really hope you enjoy the fic. You put so much work and care into hosting these events for the fandom, it really is appreciated 🤗

I've actually had this story concept in mind for quite a while. I love that pretty much all of your prompts/wish-list items were able to fit in! We've got some platonic Hunter, romantic Crosshair, a little angst, a bit of fluff... Perfect!

Oh, and to keep things spoiler free (on my blog and for the event), this takes place before Order 66 and Omega.

Please go check out the @cloneficgiftexchange blog for all the other contributions to this great event! Fics are being posted all throughout today (4/13/24). Spread the love for fandom writers/creators by reblogging!

Vandor-3. Clone training facility: recreation sector. Winter.

You sat slumped over the bar, a drink cradled in your arms. You took lazy sips at the liquid, long past its effervescence, in between chewing on the straw. You could smell the evidence of your waning hygiene, being curled in on yourself like this. It disgusted you but not enough to do anything beyond self loathing. To say you were miserable was an understatement.

"Morning, Captain. A bit early for a drink, isn't it?"

The husky voice of the bar's newcomer was unmistakeable in who it belonged to. There were clones abound on this small moon, hundreds of identical-sounding men. But every once in a while you had the pleasure of hearing the one that was different.

You sluggishly swiveled your head and gave Sergeant Hunter a mock salute. He leaned against the bar beside you, seemingly torn between being amused and concerned by what he was seeing.

"Back so soon?" you asked, ignoring his own question. Though your speech wasn't slurred, your voice still betrayed some of the numbness you were working to surround yourself in. Which helped your friend make up his mind on how to feel.

"Easy mission," Hunter shrugged off the topic. "You okay? Did something happen?"

"No," you sighed and forced yourself to sit upright. Best to appear more in control and not give him reason to drag you to the med bay. "That's the problem. Nothing's happened."

Hunter frowned and slid onto the barstool next to you. You caught a whiff of soap as he did, a harsh contrast to your own odor that made you even more upset.

"I don't understand."

Your hands cupped around your glass, condensation pooling around your fingers, and you stared at the melting ice wishing to be as frozen and unfeeling.

"I don't understand, either," you whispered. "Why I'm still so... alone."

"Ah." Hunter placed a sympathetic hand on your shoulder. "That's right, you had that date you were going on. Another dud, then?"

You nodded, still refusing to look away from the ice cubes.

He hummed in thought. Your poor friend. How many times had he now had to come up with some sort of reassuring comment after another one of your failed attempts to find love? At least you were grateful you had such a friend, though. Where others would have made you feel guilty for admitting to loneliness, would have insisted they were company enough and all you had to do was ask for it, it's as simple as that, how dare you feel lonely when you aren't actually alone... Hunter was the one who always saw through to what you really meant. You were not what the other wanted, but you were both wanting, craving that kind of deep, romantic connection that seemed to allude you both. For Hunter, it was obviously his schedule that got in his way. For you... well, that was the mystery.

"You have to keep looking," was the sentiment Hunter settled on this time. He rubbed at your shoulder a bit, as if trying to smooth out your misery.

You huffed. His attempts to comfort were sweet, but not enough. You couldn't help but protest. "But with everyone I meet, I just find out what I don't want. What am I even looking for?"

"I don't know," Hunter shook his head sadly. "I don't know if anyone knows until they find it."

You groaned and slumped back forward, facepalming the bar top and wishing you could sink right into it. Sink down, down, down until you disappeared completely.

"Sorry, Cap," Hunter's now muffled voice attempted to chuckle, lighten the mood. "If I could track down your soul mate, I would. You know I would."

That comment was sweet enough. You forced yourself to stop sinking, lift yourself up again, and face your friend properly.

"I know. And I appreciate that. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be such a bummer today. It's just... it's been getting harder, is all."

He nodded and you nodded back and nothing further needed to be understood on the matter.

"Were you needing something from me?" you changed the subject. "Or did you come to day drink as well?"

"Ha, ha." Hunter started to get up. "Yeah no, I just wanted to let you know we were back for a few rotations, see if you'd have some time to finally come out and meet the boys."

You lifted up your glass and shook it a bit. "You're too late, I'm afraid. If I'd known you'd be back so soon, I wouldn't have started on this journey of self destruction."

Hunter titled his head at you, some of that trademark concern still showing. "This isn't going to be an all week thing, is it?"

You shrugged. Truthfully, you had no idea what to do with yourself. Making decisions even a day in advance seemed like too big of a commitment in your fragile state.

"I'd rather not meet any more new people right now, if it's all the same to you."

"I wouldn't consider them new. You've heard enough stories about each other by now. It's starting to get weird that you're not meeting, quite frankly."

You wanted to laugh, but the thought of introductions, stiff pleasantries, awkward small talk... It reminded you of every first date that never turned into a second, every dating app chat thread that went nowhere, every high hope you watched turn into disappointment. Even with a group like Hunter's brothers, the Bad Batch, with a reputation of being unconventional, who you'd only be making friends with just like you had with Hunter and every other clone on this moon... it was still too much for you to stomach.

"Sorry, maybe next time."

Hunter frowned, but he didn't overstep. "Suit yourself. Door's still open though. You know where to find us."

He made to walk out but paused to turn back to you for a moment.

"And hey, don't lose hope. We'll find our people soon enough. In the meantime, take care of yourself, alright?"

You waited until the bar doors closed behind him to let your tears fall.

* * *

Vandor-3. Woodland outskirts. Spring.

You were here. Finally.

You weren't able to pinpoint exactly where the turning point occurred, between crying yourself to sleep every night and being able to wake up with a smile on your face. A small one, of course, but a smile nonetheless. You weren't even sure it was something that had happened overnight. Slowly, eventually, the frost over your heart melted, the shadows in your thoughts grew thinner and lighter. Without even realizing you were drawing back the curtains and dusting off the shelves and each day being a little more open than you were the day before.

Your loneliness still existed. It came and went in waves, so while still devastating at times, you were at least afforded with periods of relief. Periods where you could smile again, find fulfillment in your work, and even dare to allow yourself to dream again. And not to mention taking more regular showers. It was always the little things that made the biggest difference, wasn't it?

And now here you were, standing in the early morning sun out in one of the training fields, the Havoc Marauder silhouetted against the sunrise as you shook hands with its crew in a meeting long overdue.

Hunter's stories had done the boys justice. Wrecker was just as larger than life as you'd pictured, aptly choosing to push past your outstretched hand and go in for a bone-crushing hug instead. Tech, who you'd come to know as the brains of the batch, only spared a second to be properly introduced before returning to fidget with some gadget. Echo was all politeness and disciplined respect, with his scomp-salute and ma'ams. And Crosshair... well, he was still on the ship asleep, which you supposed fit with the few facts you knew about him, too.

Hunter beamed beside them, clearly happy you had finally made the effort to meet his squad. His family, really. As a Captain overseeing drill training for the GAR, you knew better than anyone the close bonds these clones formed even before they stepped foot on a battlefield. This meant a lot to him, you being here. You felt awful for postponing so many times.

Once introductions were out of the way, and some pleasant conversation had passed, you eventually ventured out to the part of the training field that actually housed elements for training - your excuse for coming out here to meet everyone. A munitions crate full of shiny new blasters was carried between you and Wrecker while Hunter ran ahead to set up some targets. Tech and Echo went back to the ship to work on repairs.

"Aaaaugh. Only blasters?" Wrecker lamented upon opening the crate.

"Sorry, more budget cuts. This was all I could scrounge up for you guys."

Hunter was much more excited by the new weapons, though Wrecker still picked one up to try out. You held one as well but only used it to demonstrate different techniques. Just because you were good at training didn't mean you were the best at actually fighting.

The three of you picked off the various bottles, pots, and pans that Hunter had set up amongst the tree branches at the edge of the field for a short while. And on more than one occasion you found yourself pausing to breathe in the air and remind yourself that life was good. Maybe not how you wanted it, but it was still good and you'd need to continue to work on appreciating what you had.

After about an hour, there were only three bottles and a pan left, all proving tricky targets due to distance and angle. Hunter had even tried slinging a few knives to no avail.

"Okay I'm calling it," Wrecker announced with a huff. "One more missed shot and I'm blowing them up."

"I'll take that bet."

A new voice, one you'd never heard before, carried across the field. It was delicate and drawling and confident. Hunter chuckled and Wrecker rolled his eyes. And you... you had no idea that everything was about to change.

It was like he was moving in slow motion. Your surroundings blurred as the lanky figure caught the corner of your eye, your heart rate slowing as you turned and took him in. One confident step planted firmly in front of the other as he inched across the field. A sniper rifle perched on his shoulder. A toothpick between pursed lips. An eye surrounded by a reticle and narrowed in determination. He didn't even spare you a glance, and thank the gods, because if he had, you were sure your heart would've stopped beating altogether.

He squared off as soon as he reached the marks, bringing his rile forward to aim in a swift and careful motion. His head rested against the shaft, his tattooed eye squinted through the scope. You imagined him taking this stance a thousand times in his short life. It looked as natural a position as curling up on a couch might look for you.

You couldn't look away, not wanting to miss a single second of whatever this mesmerizing man was about to do. He was still for a moment, impressively so. You realized you were holding your breath as you watched, not wanting even your exhale to interfere with his process.

And then he fired. Once, twice, threefourfive times. Bang, bang, bang. Each in a different direction but no less precise than the one before. The first ricocheted off the pan and hit the green bottle, just as the second hit the red bottle. The three-shot volley was aimed at the branch the bottles sat on, causing it to crack and dangle even closer to the ground. And just when you thought the show couldn't be more over the top, the sniper swiveled his rifle toward the sky at a passing bird, clipped its wing with a shot, and then whipped out a pistol from his hip and fired at the remaining blue bottle just before the branch snapped and fell to the ground.

A few seconds later, the bird tumbled on top of the pile of shattered glass and splintered wood.

"Aaaand training is now over," said Hunter with a nod of his head. He raised his voice as he called out to his brother. "You'd better clean that shit up!"

The sniper flipped him the bird before sauntering off to clean up.

"Uh, you alright?"

Hunter paused in his own packing of gear to give you a concerned look. You were still staring after the newcomer, undoubtedly the lone Batcher you had yet to meet. Crosshair. Your brain had short-circuited with what you had witnessed him do, yes. But it was more than that. There was something about him. Something intriguing and attractive. Different than anyone you had ever known, and yet, somehow feeling so real and comfortable at the same time.

After a few waves of your friend's hand in your face, you snapped back.

"That," you breathed.

Hunter cocked a confused eyebrow.

"That is what I'm looking for."

* * *

Vandor-3. Clone training facility: recreation sector. Summer.

You were insanely busy. Separatist activity was ramping up in almost every corner of the galaxy and the GAR was responding to each new threat with full force. Rotations of new clone units were frequently arriving at the facility, one after another. You'd cycle them through a few trainings to get them certified on whatever was needed and then ship them right back out. And in between were all the additional tasks that needed to be taken care of. Piles of paperwork and coordinating schedules and ship inspections and updated security debriefings.

And yet through it all, you still had time to entertain the one thought that buzzed in the background of your mind: Crosshair. Every meeting, every meal, every training sim, first thing in the morning and last thing at night. He was there. Crosshair, Crosshair, Crosshair. On your mind, in your heart, driving you absolutely mad.

In the beginning you'd pretended it wasn't about him, specifically. You were simply happy to know what you wanted now, that you had a type and it existed. That was all. Hunter had turned up his nose, completely bewildered as to why that would be your type. You hadn't been able to give him much at the time; it would take you many rotations more to start describing the details of your newly discovered attraction.

But over time, it became harder to push aside the nagging thought that you hadn't found what you were looking for, but rather who. Specifically. Exactly. Why try to find someone like him when you already liked... him?

Oh there were plenty of ways you could answer that question, all of them self-deprecating and none of them productive. You could count on one hand now the number of times you had been in the same room as him, let alone interacted with him. The Batch may be frequenting the place more often as the war picked up, but not nearly as often as you needed to gauge whether someone like Crosshair would, could, or honestly even should be as interested in you as you were in him.

Today they were back on the grounds so Hunter could fill out some paperwork, and your heart had not stopped racing all morning. It was practically threatening to punch right out of your chest and run away. You weren't sure why, considering you'd probably only end up seeing Hunter this time. The rest of the Batch usually didn't venture into the facility unless they were staying overnight. But it seemed even knowing Crosshair was on the same planet as you got you worked up these days.

You carried Hunter's stack of paperwork with you now, intending to drop it off to him in between some meetings you had. As you hustled down the halls, you rehearsed a few ways you could subtly ask him how Crosshair was doing.

But as it turned out, you would have the opportunity to ask him yourself. If you could get over your frazzled shock at finding him in the rec room instead of Hunter.

The room was conveniently empty, making the silence between you that much more potent. Crosshair was standing awkwardly to the side, just behind one of the battered sofas, as if he had already been confused about what he should be doing before you pushed through the door. He stared at you and you stared at him and the moment only lasted for a few seconds but it felt like an eternity.

"Oh, um. Hi. Crosshair." You averted your gaze, despite having prayed the past several nights that you could see his face again soon. "I was... expecting Hunter."

That didn't sound right. You hoped he didn't take that to mean that you'd prefer if Hunter was here now. Obviously you didn't.

"He stepped out," Crosshair responded in that cool, even tone of his. Your eyes couldn't help but snap back to his as he talked. You wanted him to say more but he never did.

"Oh, okay. I just had some paperwork to give him."

Crosshair only hummed at first. You shuffled your feet a bit, debating whether you should make an attempt at small talk, try to coax more out of him, maybe even hint that you were interested in him. The thought terrified you, but not as much as the thought of being alone. You couldn't complain about that if you continued to let these opportunities pass by without at least trying to make a connection.

You shifted your weight again, intending to keep your feet planted so you wouldn't make a run for it, and Crosshair uttered your name hurriedly.

"Wait," he said. He'd thought you were leaving. You widened your eyes at him, waiting to hear what he'd wanted to tell you first. He seemed to hesitate before finally saying, "I was wondering if you knew what soup they were serving today?"

"Oh. Uh, potato, I think."

"How boring."

You smirked. "I know, right? They could at least serve it with some hot sauce."

Crosshair hummed.

The silence settled back in, though now you felt better about things. You'd practically had a conversation. Learned a little more about each other. It was a good start. 

Your commlink suddenly beeped at your side and you blanched, remembering the meeting you were supposed to be heading to.

"I uh, I've got to go. It was nice talking to you."

It pained you to cut off your moment with him so quickly, but alas you were left with no choice. You shuffled back out into the corridor, though you only made it a few steps before realizing you still had Hunter's paperwork and could just leave it with Crosshair.

The rec room had an old school door that swung in and out on hinges. It was slightly ajar from when you passed through, and already in the few seconds since something was happening on the other side of it. You could hear more voices.

"...the kriff was that?" First, the deep tones of Hunter, equal parts annoyed and weary.

"That wasn't the plan." Then, the resolute voice of Echo, backing him up.

"What?" Crosshair bit back at them.

"You were supposed to ask her out," Hunter clarified.

"No, that was not the plan," Crosshair countered. "I needed to lay some groundwork first."

"You call that groundwork? You were talking about soup."

"And she agreed. No one ever agrees with me on the soup around here."

"What a special connection," Echo said.

Hunter sighed so hard you swore you could feel the breeze through the doorway. "You know, sometimes I think some work on your communication skills wouldn't be such a bad idea."

"What?"

"Never mind. Do what you like. Keep pushing away anyone who tries to love you and see where that gets you. Just know that it's exhausting, watching the two of you dance around each other like this."

"And kind of pathetic," added Echo.

You were against the wall by the door, holding in your breath for so long you were about to pass out. Or maybe it was the euphoria of knowing Crosshair was interested that made your head sway. Regardless, you had mere moments to make a move or let the opportunity pass. You dug into your pocket, fished out a pen, and scribbled a note on the top page of paperwork. Was it professional? Absolutely not. But the GAR would get over it. You left the papers by the door, making sure your note was turned to face it.

There's better soups on Coruscant. Let's go out sometime.

* * *

Vandor-3. Woodland outskirts. Autumn.

You were alone, standing in the middle of the training field, the early setting sun behind you casting a dim shadow across the remains of your latest training exercise. A chill was just starting to set in, causing you to tug at your jacket and pull it around you a bit tighter. You liked these moments, rare as they were recently. A quiet time to yourself. Not even to think, but simply to be. Present and comfortable. And you.

The wind picked up and sang through the taller blades of grass as a ship approached for landing. Your moment was over, but a new happiness settled in its place. Minutes later, the Havoc Marauder was opening its hatch and spitting out its soldiers.

"Captain," Hunter gave you a two-finger salute as he passed by.

"Sergeant," you returned with a smile.

Echo was close behind, giving you a respectful nod. Wrecker hauled a munitions crate in one hand and hit you up for a high five with the other. Tech was oblivious as he hunched over a data pad.

They filed by, one after the other, headed straight for the barracks, and what you hoped were the showers. They all knew not to linger, that you'd catch up with them later. This was your time with Crosshair.

The sniper was leaning up against the hatch opening, arms folded across a plastoid chest and a toothpick lazily perched between slightly curled lips. He took you in for a moment and you could feel yourself glowing in response to his soft gaze.

"Showing those clankers who's boss, I see," he said as he made his way down the gangway. He nodded his head toward the mess of scrap metal behind you.

You gave a half shrug. "My reaction time is getting better, but I still can't get the angles right with those pucks."

Crosshair inched up to you, gently resting his hands on either side of your waist. "Have you been doing the breathing exercises like I showed you?"

You nodded. Your hands instinctually came up to his run along his arms until they found the crook of his elbows, the only place not barring your touch by armor.

"And using the laser sight?"

You nodded a little slower and Crosshair tsked.

"I want to be good without it. Like you." You added a little extra honey to your words so he wouldn't reprimand you too much. It had been an adjustment for the two of you at first, he stepping into a training role and you stepping back to receive instruction for once. Thankfully the frustrations seemed to diminish the more your relationship progressed.

"You have to be patient," he said, giving your waist a slight squeeze to accentuate his point. "You aren't like the regs you train. You're building your skills, taking care of yourself."

You hummed, more in thought than agreement. "Will I ever have to use these skills someday, do you think? Is it really getting that bad out there?"

You tried not to think about how many soldiers you had trained only to be sent to a battlefield to die. How many of the shinies you were drilling right now would likely be killed soon. How many more would be brought in to take their place. You'd thought you'd known what you were getting yourself into with this job. But the relentless cycle of it all was getting to you more and more, especially as the Republic continued to be challenged in larger scales and higher stakes. It never seemed to end.

"It's hard to say," Crosshair responded. "We have to prepare for the worst."

You hated that answer, but you wouldn't let him see it. Not yet. Your fears and your displeasures, anger and sorrow, were things yet to be fully explored in this new relationship. All in due time. So you simply smiled, plucked the toothpick out of his mouth and tossed it aside. 

"And hope for the best, right?"

He smiled back, or at least moved his mouth in the direction of a smile, as much as you could usually get from the reserved man. "Yes, of course."

He leaned forward and rested his forehead against yours. You both closed your eyes and breathed each other in. There was warmth in his embrace. A promise in the steady hands he held you with. Vulnerability in the skin that gently touched yours. To have someone this close, someone who was still more stranger than friend, though no less beloved, was what you had always wanted. And for once, what you wanted was just as lovely and fulfilling as you'd hoped. No catch. No deals. No unintended consequences. Just you and him and happiness.

All too soon he pulled away. His hand sought yours as he turned in the direction of the barracks. The longer you stayed behind, the worse the teasing from the others would be. They were only respectful of your relationship to a point, and after that it was fair game for a laugh. So you willingly followed.

"Crosshair?"

"Hm?"

"I was thinking about Hunter...."

The sniper glanced at you suspiciously.

"Well, you know he and I have been friends for a while. And he's confided a few things in me before. About what he wants. Or thinks he wants. He's changed his mind a few times on the specifics. But all in the same gist."

"Where are you going with this?"

"I don't know, I just feel like I owe him for helping me get through a tough time. And if it weren't for him, I wouldn't have ever met you. So--"

Crosshair cut you off with a groan. "If you're trying to get me to play matchmaker..."

"It would get some of the attention off of us," you quickly offered. "If Hunter had someone he was bringing around, too. Or even just interested in."

Crosshair frowned in thought. "There was a bartender on Scarif he kept checking out..."

You grinned and squeezed his hand affectionately. "See? Just keep an eye out and nudge him a bit. Who knows what could happen."

You could tell he was trying not to roll his eyes for your sake. Instead he squeezed your hand in return. "Or you could come with us and nudge him yourself?"

Your walking slowed, right as you were about to cross the facility boundary line. You would have to let go of his hand once you crossed it, keep a professional distance, share your company with others. And once the Batch's business here concluded, then you would have to let him go and watch him disappear into the sky with all the prayers you could possibly send with him. And then you would be on your own. Waiting, waiting, always waiting. And maybe he would return, and maybe he wouldn't.

And heaven forbid you would ever end up alone again.

"Or you can stay," he said. The quietness of his voice betrayed what he really meant, what he really wanted. 

And you knew what you wanted, too. Without you realizing, it was getting easier and easier for you to define your desires. And not only that, but to pursue them, too. To know your happiness was worth the risk of disappointment. It was clear to you now that you were not only worthy, but also capable. The man standing before you, holding your hand, gazing at you like nothing else mattered, was proof enough.

And so you said, "Take me with you."

Every Character Tag: @dangerousstrawberrypie, @justanothersadperson93, @arctrooper69, @sleepycreativewriter, @techie-bear, @theroguesully, @cw80831, @cdblake1565

Bad Batch Tag: @kaijusplotch, @rebel-finn, @lucyysthings, @marvel-starwars-nerd, @nekotaetae, @severalseashellsbytheseashore, @lackofhonor, @flowered-bicycles, @foodmoneyandcats, @nahoney22, @dangraccoon, @lulalovez, @aconstructofamind, @skellymom, @the-mom-friend-dot-com

✨Join A Tag List Here!✨

🍾 One Shots Master List | 🌙 Master List of Master Lists

#star wars #the clone wars #the bad batch #crosshair #crosshair x reader #fluff #angst #romance #cloneficgiftexchange #hunter #wrecker #echo #tech

[roseaesynstylae]

My Favorites of Jedi Appreciation

So, I've been thinking about Jedi positivity a lot lately. So, I decided to make a masterpost. Someone's definitely done this before and better, but I feel like I should throw my hat in the ring.

(There's also A Collection of Posts about the Jedi Order, Part One and Part Two.)

Fics

These fics might not be completely focused on the Jedi Order but they are portrayed positively, or they expand on their culture. Either way, I love them.

Knightrise by deviantaccumulation: In which a new Jedi Order is founded on Mandalore after Order 66.

not the place i was born in (doesn't mean it's not the place where I belong) by ghostwriterofthemachine: Jedi worldbuilding and Young Anakin and Obi-Wan being sweet.

How a Handful of Droid Poppers Save the Galaxy by Zarz: In which Appo is the hero the galaxy needs and Anakin meets consequences.

Yeet or be Yeeted by virdant: In which the Jedi tendency to jump off tall places becomes a competitive sport.

THE FORCE WILLS DOCUMENTARY by js71: Told as a documentary about the Jedi Order, there's a lot of worldbuilding and other things that make my heart happy.

Pragmatics of the Jedi by aroacejoot, ghostwriterofthemachine, loosingletters: A series that created a language for the Jedi, Dai Bendu, which is absolutely fascinating.

On Meditation by virdant: A short fic about meditation. It makes me happy.

Interviews by BloodyDevil: Interviews with members of the Jedi Order.

In which we burn bodies as bridges by GraceEliz: Jedi mourning in a bittersweet fic.

Anakin Skywalker's Guide to Jedi Traditions by loosingletters: A young Anakin's journal about his new life in the Jedi Order.

The Droid Wars by Crystalshard: R2 learns about the future and drags 3PO along with him to stop it.

Why We Did Nothing by BairnSidhe: Do you like the Mandalorians as well as the Jedi? In which the Mandalorians learn about the Jedi Order's perspective on things and Jaster gets rightfully mad. Warning: It has dark themes (among them, discussions of the murder of children, generational trauma, and Montross-related fuckery).

spilled red wine by scrapheap_redux: I was debating whether or not to add this one, but I really liked the portrayal of the Jedi when they show up. However, it has the aftermath and results of rape (not onscreen) as the inciting incident, which is why I was wondering if I should add it; I want this list to be enjoyable and I don't want to upset anyone.

Unsolicited PR From A Pirate by Everything_or_Anything, lastbattlecry, RogueLadyVader (LaylaYuy), TessaDoesThings, wanderingjedihistorian (RangerJedi67): Hondo is a menace. Also, action figures.

Stolen Choices by softmoonlight: Cal, Fox, and the possibility of a happy ending.

free to find my calling by Papook: Jocasta Nu gets a squad of clones.

Always in Motion by virdant: I never knew I needed a Chewbacca time-travel fic so much.

remember me, fondly by ace_din_djarin: Crafts, Jedi, and bittersweetness.

The Bust Busting by virdant: Yoda is a troll. Dooku is done.

Proper Attire by LacieFuyu: Why Jedi don't wear armor.

Out with Lanterns by SkyeBean: Ahsoka is Mace's Padawan.

Lessons of Peace by virdant: Cody embracing Jedi culture and making dumplings.

Memories of Peace by Margan: Obi-Wan teaches the clones to make dumplings.

Home-onym by virdant: Wordplay and Jedi younglings.

In the Shadows (of Taxes) by virdant: Quinlan Vos specializes in tax law. If that one sentence doesn't make your heart jump a little, I weep for you.

hi, i'm with public relations by lastbattlecry: The Jedi need better PR. Bail Organa knows somebody.

In Which Boba Fett Becomes the Jedi Order's Feral Tooka by Zarz: The title explains the beautiful, beautiful plot.

May the Force be Taxed by ReconstructWriter: Palpatine and the IRS do not respect Jedi culture.

aphelion by Kemmasandi: Plo Koon dies, wakes up decades prior, and fixes things.

Protect That Which You Love by certifiedspacewitch: Mace takes one look at the weird old man asking for private access to a young Padawan and gets his hackles up.

jedi shaming by braigwen_s, evaceratops: Short but hilarious.

The Chess Match Begins by SilverWingedWolf: The relationships between Jedi and clones.

Five Jedi Who Signed the Wall on Mapuzo, and Two that Honored Them by TheSecondBatgirl: The title explains the premise in the best way.

You're Not Flawed Darling (You're just a Little Under Rehearsed) by CombatBootsandDreams: To quote the tags, the Jedi diplomatic corps is intense.

A Little Piece of Home by Maeve_of_Winter: Anakin discovers a new form of moving meditation but worries Obi-Wan won't approve. Quinlan does his best to encourage Anakin to tell him anyway.

shining like a lighthouse from the sky by loosingletters: Rumor has it, if you clean up one of the droids in the temple the day before your Gathering, Anakin Skywalker himself will take you to Ilum. Or: Anakin loses his lightsabers and is absolutely popular with teeny tiny Initiates.

the heart of kyber by outpastthemoat: Stories about lightsabers, masters, and apprentices.

吃飽了嗎? | Have you eaten your fill? by virdant: A collection of fics about food and how food is an articulation of love.

I'm Counting On You by Rivulet07: Not all initiates become Jedi, Mace helps Chirrut find his place.

Being a Jedi by wanderingjedihistorian (RangerJedi67): Scenes, musings and drabbles for Jedi June fan event.

Jedi Parables by Peppermint_Shamrock: Values are often passed down generation to generation through stories, parables, and fables. What stories might the Jedi teach their children?

Five Meditations of Jedi Depa Billaba by skatzaa: What is says on the tin. (Plus one more, for good measure.)

Jedi Culture and Teachings in Canon by gffa: Not a fanfic, exactly, but it's a collection of everything textually said in Disney canon about or by the Jedi Order.

Emotion is our Shared Tongue by virdant: A series of one-shots and fics that explore Jedi language and communication with the Force.

Saber-Assigned Soulmates by inimitability: A slight mishap in the mess hall leads to Obi-Wan giving some very interested troopers a crash courses in lightsabers. Specifically, why some people can pick them up but others can't. Even more specifically, what Jedi erotica holonovels did or didn't get right regarding lightsabers and soulmates.

Shereshoy by SailorSol: This was not how Mace wanted to start his day. Contrary to popular belief, Mace Windu did not actually enjoy being a hardass. But as head of the Order, it was a carefully crafted persona he did his best to maintain anywhere outside of private quarters and behind closed Council doors.

permission to speak by qigiined: Mace is trying his damnedest to file the Temple's taxes among other daily tasks. Plo and the rest of the Jedi Council help and hinder him.

Blogs

There are only so many times I can say "I love this so much, it makes me happy, please know you have filled my head with knowledge and my heart with joy" before it gets repetitive.

gffa: FILLED WITH WONDERFUL THINGS. I would marry this blog if I could. (I'm joking...mostly.)

projediagenda: All kinds of thought-provoking stuff that makes me happy.

ensomniaa: As they put it, nothing but love for the Jedi.

the-jedi-love: Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

#star wars #pro jedi #jedi positivity #jedi appreciation #jedi culture #would you believe that this came from reading repcomm and needing an antidote to anti-jedi bullshit? #i will probably be updating this #i love the jedi order so much

[rorywritesjunk]

Buggy the Ultimate Dad

Here's more on my headcanons about Buggy being a dad. I had fun writing this a few weeks ago. I have no definitive idea where any of these kids fit into canon at this point. In some way you could look at it that Buggy and his lady started having kids real young so that would put Lil Buggy about 16ish during Orangetown, but like, that takes the fun out of the one shot I have for her that I'm going to post next.

Enjoy!

Lil Buggy is a literal copy of her dad. Hair, nose, facial expressions, and even attitude made you wonder how you birthed his clone. Once Lil learned to talk she would mimic whatever Buggy said when he ordered the crew around. Yes, even swearing, though it was cuter when an 18 month old swore than when Buggy did.

Mae was just as feisty as her sister but didn’t start talking until she was almost three. You, Lil, and Buggy had to rely on her facial expressions and made up sign language to know what she wanted. There were days as she got older when she wouldn’t talk and would fall back on using the sign language you all created, and at that point the whole family knew it.

Cherry was more like Lil than Apple. She enjoyed being at her father’s side whenever he was working with the crew, and he had no problem having her on his shoulders while ordering the crew to fire cannons at any unsuspecting ships. (Mae and Lil were always by his side and you worried for their hearing so you insisted on at least the three girls wearing ear plugs when this happened, Buggy didn’t care too much for himself)

Apple was the opposite of her three sisters. She would rather have a book in her hands than a sword, and before she could read she would bring a book to you or Buggy when she wanted to be read to. Every time she went to Buggy he was in the middle of something, but he couldn’t say no to her asking so he would stop whatever it was to sit somewhere and read to her. 

Heck, Buggy couldn’t really say no to any of the girls. Three of them were his little Mini-Mes, and when they looked up at him with big, pleading eyes he would cave. (Mae actually felt left out not looking like her sisters and often put a red dot on her nose so she could fit in. (Buggy may have cried to you about that))

Rain’s favorite thing to do was organize things. Toys lined up in a row, books organized by their height on the shelf, and she even got into Buggy’s makeup and organized it all by colors. He was absolutely horrified when he found out because he had his own system to how it was all organized! You managed to keep Buggy from having a meltdown and he decided to look into some kind of playset for her that would let her organize and reorganize things to her little heart’s content. 

Bow always initiated the tea parties. All the girls liked having them with their dad (you were included at times as well! You weren’t left out of these events), but Bow loved having them. She wanted everyone to dress up and drink the pretend tea while she served them, pretending to be a little host while walking around their makeshift tables and chairs, offering more tea or cookies.

After six daughters, Buggy proposed to you, and while you wanted something small and intimate, this was Buggy the Clown. It was flashy, loud, with fireworks going off and all kinds of excitement. He cried, you cried, and the girls had fun. 

Pumpkin likes to be involved in everyone’s business. Even if she’s not asked she somehow worms her way into whatever her parents or sister’s are doing. She becomes good at reading people because there are times they don’t want her involved so she picks up on when she needs to leave them alone, but sometimes when her sisters or parents are upset and they insist they are fine, she won’t leave them alone because she wants to make sure they’re okay.

Crash is the human embodiment of a chaotic child. Buggy thought his oldest was bad, Crash was born during a damn storm on the ship. She had no fear of anything and countless times had to be stopped from eating gunpowder, Buggy’s makeup, your jewelry, and her sisters’ things. Her favorite thing to do was pull on Richie’s tail. She grows up to be rather fearless, has no problem telling someone they’re stupid or wrong, and will stand up for what she believes in. 

Nine months after Crash’s first raid, she is probably the most excited about having a baby brother join the crew. Despite being the Chaos Child (the nickname her sisters gave her), Crash is incredibly gentle with Baby Bear. He grows up under her watchful eye, which her parents are a little grateful for because after those eight daughters, they are tired. (Though they are very much the parents and never expect or ask Crash to do anything, for him, she just does it because she loves her baby bro)

Bear looks just like you. No traces of his father are seen until gets into an argument with his dad at the age of five over naptime, then you both saw Buggy’s angry face crossover his cute little face and well, he was Buggy’s son. 

Bear learns to Respect Women. He drinks the juice from the moment he was born until he’s 14 and on his first raid with his dad and sisters (you really didn’t do the piracy thing anymore, you just helped with the daily tasks on the ship at that point). Some asshole made a comment about his sisters, all eight of them, and he had no problem headbutting the jerk in the face and kicking him in the crotch. 

You were absolutely done having kids. No more after Bear, and Buggy was fine with that. He was happy that his kids survived life on a ship up until adulthood. 

#buggy the clown #buggy the clown x reader #buggy x reader #buggy x you #buggy the clown x you #opla buggy the clown x reader #opla buggy the clown #opla buggy x reader #opla buggy the clown x you #buggy headcanons #one piece headcanons #opla buggy x you

[xecutivecucumber]

Executive Cucumber's thoughts on the Bad Batch episode 3×08 (spoilers after the cut)

Forgive me if these thoughts are less coherent than usually, I'm pretty freaking tired atm. Thoughts are as much in order as I can manage.

Firstly, this episode was a much needed, lower emotionally charged break from the last...seven episodes of the season. The thing about stories is that they can't be running at warp 9 the entire time. It will burn your audience out. Heck, I'm at a lower energy, transitiatory part of my long fic. So yeah, this episode didn't cause the emotional damage and stress that the last 7 did, but that's a good thing.

Omega has the neurodivergent ✨️leg jiggle✨️

Poor dear needs a hug and for someone to free the Tantiss clones.

PHEE MY QUEEN

Crosshair's face when Omega says 'liberator of ancient wonders' I love him.

Okay, I know that a lot of people are upset about Phee not being more emotional about Tech. I've got a few thoughts on that. My expectations going into the scene with her was that she wasn't going to be mentioning Tech. So when she did, I was really happy. She doesn't need to bring him up in the conversation, but she does.

So let's dive a little deeper into this. There are only two people who have brought up Tech without any prompting so far: Echo and Phee. Omega only mentions him when it's a direct answer to Crosshair's question. Hunter, Crosshair, and Wrecker have not mentioned him once by name. Now, I think this is because Echo and Phee have both known loss and know better how to handle it. The rest of the Batch hasn't, before Tech. We have watched practically all of Echo's loss, but not Phee's. However, we know that Pabu is a place for refugees, which Phee likely is. She's lost at least a home, if not family and friends. Add on top of that Phee is just in general a world wide person, and I think we can assume that she's someone who's got a more healthy way of processing grief than our emotionally stunted soldiers.

Something that you do with people that you've loved and lost is remember them. That's what I see Phee doing here. She's managed to process her grief in the last 4 months, and she's keeping the memory of someone she cared about alive by mentioning him in conversation.

So yeah. I liked that scene and it warmed my Tech/Phee loving heart.

Anyways,

Oooooh Fennec!!!

I love Crosshair not knowing anything but it also makes me sad.

Hunter: try to get Crosshair to get his hand looked at

Omega: what do you mean 'try'

Thoughts on Crosshair and Omega scenes:

What did my poor boy go through????

Poor man is probably resisting the idea that it's in his head because he already HAD a thing in his head that ruined his life

Omega: you don't like anything

Crosshair: true

Your honor I would die for them. Also I find his 'true' to be a little sad (and adorable)

OMG THEY'RE MEDITATING (and they have somehow stolen YET ANOTHER thing from my fic, this time before I've even gotten past the concept stage)

Omega: you missed a lot

Crosshair: I know

He's thinking of Tech in that moment.

Oh my gosh her hand on his and how he lets her move his hand THEY ARE TRYING TO KILL ME.

The Bad Batch says take care of your mental

Thoughts about Space Everglades:

I really loved Wrecker this episode. He really got to shine. He has the most banter with Fennec, he gets to do his demo thing, he freaking curb stomps space alligators, and he's the MVP in getting the bug man. It was really nice. Also, 'YOU HEARD ME!!!!' Let Wrecker go feral.

Bro, I really liked the bar music. I like seeing more of the music that plays in universe.

Wrecker and Hunter are definitely having flashbacks to Cid this entire episode. Except Fennec gives them more intel.

Fennec is a delight as always.

My prediction to who she's selling them out to? Ventress. And I don't think Ventress' intentions are bad.

So yeah, a solid episode! I'm honestly probably going to leave a lot of the star wars subreddits just to avoid everyone and their dog complaining about filler. Which this was NOT.

And as the next episode is called the Harbinger, I feel like this might be one of our last breaths before the plunge and everything goes sideways.

Oh, and in case you forgot. Tech lives ❤️

#the bad batch #tbb #the bad batch season 3 spoilers #tbb season 3 spoilers #tbb spoilers #the bad batch spoilers #bad batch #the bad batch season 3 #tbb season 3 #tbb crosshair #tbb omega #tbb hunter #tbb wrecker #phee genoa #fennec shand #asajj ventress #soft crosshair #tbb tech #tbb echo #we support phee genoa in this household #phee genoa positive #i'd be more silly but I'm freaking tired #turns out i lack the ability to sleep when my cat Phee is cuddling me for 4 hours #tech lives

[st4rrych111]

im not sure if this has been said on tumblr before but it actually fucks me up so badly the way anakin and obi wan both interpret their relationship so differently. here is my ramble of the night apologies in advance !

in attack of the clones, anakin says TO OBI WANS FACE that he is the closest he has to a father. it is such an earnestly raw passing comment to a dry comment obi wan makes but it says so much. little boy born out of virginity, no father in his life, being swept of to coruscant by qui gon whos dead before they can even leave. growing up under obi wans shaky guiding hands and even sleeping at the foot of his bed, still reeling from the loss of his only family. but

obi wan was only a padawan when he was entrusted with this little boy. the chosen one. a final request from his dying master no less and hes terrified and doesnt feel ready but he does it anyways. he worries about the most insignificant, fatherly things a man could- can anakin swim? he is protective and almost resents the way the council refuses to hear qui gons point of view, ignoring anakins feats in the force and status of the chosen one. obi wan KNOWS their relationship always pushed the master-student dynamic into something more familial, but he doesn't stop it. he tries so hard to help balance the duty of the order and anakins personal feelings, he even says so to padme in a deleted revenge of the sith scene, that he had ignored their marriage for the sake of anakins happiness. he wouldve done anything to fill that aching void in anakins chest that called out for a parent, but he was torn between what he was taught, what he felt about himself and what he felt was appropriate. and still,

obi wan only ever calls him his padawan, his brother, his anakin. he still felt like a kid when anakin was assigned. but then anakin gets older! hes a young man now and finds obiwans odd-brotherly-fatherly gaze too harsh. anakin is ready to turn away, to stop clawing for obi wans attention, his attachment the way he once did, wanting a different kind of approval, approval that will tell him hes ready to be a knight, a master, the best of the best. so obi wan tries resolving with a more brotherly relationship. closer to equals, although not quite which still upsets anakin

so of course, all of this comes to the front in revenge of the sith. "you were my brother anakin, i loved you." at that time, anakin really was his brother. anakin's yearning for a father had been quenched by palpatines manipulative affection. and now, obi wan was only the man that lead him, the man that kept him in the order. obi wan did love him, but it did not fulfil all of what anakin needed.

to obi wan, anakin is his brother. his little padawan, then his little brother.

to anakin, obi wan is his father. perhaps even his everything at one point. then he is his brother, from a distance. when obi wan is anakins brother, his father is palpatine. and then to anakin, obi wan is his enemy.

#star wars #obi wan #anakin skywalker #they make me so so sad #puhLEASE dont tag as ship i will froth at the mouth #st4rry speaks #theyve been analysed so well alr bc cool well spoken ppl on tumblr like the pt so here is my 2 cents just in case anyone needed /sar/pos #its deffo been said before but just incase u guys didnt know they make me miserable and consume my every passing thought <3 #feel free to add on i love shared fan culture let me hear it :3

[dumbfinntales]

I recently completed a game that caught me completely by surprise. My Friendly Neighborhood. On the surface you might look at it and go “ugh another yucky mascot horror indie slop?” and trust me, when I initially saw the game I thought the same thing. I’ve fundamentally grown to dislike mascot horror, or kid friendly horror. So few games actually get it right, and most are really dumb. I’m not gonna name any so I don’t upset people, but imagine if you take Bob the builder. Okay, now he’s Frank the breaker and oh he has sharp teeth and red eyes. That’s how these types of games seem like to me.

So I kind of dismissed MFN when I first saw it. But lo and behold, a few days after the games release I saw a tweet on twitter of someone calling it a “survival horror” game and I couldn’t believe my eyes. I looked into it and by god, it really is one, and inspired by classic Resident Evil titles too. A fucking RE clone with muppets? I gave the game a chance and it blew me away. MFN is a genuinely fun and competent survival horror game with great atmosphere, fun combat and intriguing puzzles to solve.

The best part to me is that the game isn’t trying too hard to be scary. Sure it’s called survival “horror”, but it feels kinda light hearted and does parody of popular horror tropes like a bathtub with a body in it that you have to drain for an item. The puppets themselves are really charming and I enjoyed their demented rambles. My favorite line went something like “My friend recently really upset me. So you know what I did? I SHOVED them into the ground and STOMPED their face!” and they say all this in a very muppety voice which is hilarious. The point is that they’re not giving the puppets sharp teeth and demented lines like “I’ll eat your flesh” in order to be “scary”. The devs knew it would be impossible to make the muppets scary, so they leaned more on a parody.

Being inspired by classic RE games the game has a lot of familiar DNA like obscure puzzles, doors that require specific keys, backtracking, inventory management and even limited saves. Although on survival difficulty there was more than plenty of resources and save points so I never felt like I was running out of saves, or ammo or even health. The level design was also great and the world looped on itself in interesting ways and backtracking wasn’t as tedious and there was always some surprises waiting for you.

The game also seems plenty replayable and you can unlock different cheats by finding collectibles around the world. It isn’t overly long, which to me is a plus especially in a game that’s meant to be replayable, so I’ll definitely play through the game again on harder difficulties and maybe chase after some achievements.

But do I have anything negative to say? Well mainly nitpicks. The game could have benefited from more basic enemy types than just the puppets that chase after you and the small hand puppets. There’s also level specific “hazard” puppets, if you can call them that, but I dunno. It would have felt a little more interesting with some variation in what enemies you normally encounter. There’s also only two proper bosses in the game and the first one is way too easy as it goes down with just two grenades. I genuinely thought it had a second phase or I’d encounter it again, but nope. The last boss was alright, although really easy to avoid. At least it took a fight.

So yeah. How’s that for an indie surprise? There’s a lesson to be learned, never judge a book by its cover. But can you blame me for doubting? There’s way too many kiddie horror games trying to have deep lore and be all spooky and failing horribly. But MFN is a genuine gem, if you enjoy classic survival horror games do give it a try!

#my friendly neighborhood #a review type of deal

[lil-purple-mouse-writes]

Demon Slayer Halloween Headcanons, Part 3

I am so sorry this is late, school has been kicking my butt. I hope y'all like it though!

CW: decapitation and, like, 2 swears. I know some people aren't comfortable with that.

Rui dressed up as a Spider Witch and brought along a bunch of 'little' spider friends for Trick-or-Treating. Whenever someone would refuse to give him candy, he would give them a new spider 'friend.' "Upper six told me it was 'Trick-OR-Treat.' They had the choice, and so did I."

Enmu: This psychopath went as a vampire and accidentally copied Daki. Daki forced him to change, so they went as a train conductor. ":)"

Gyutaro was not going to do anything this year, but he got roped into taking Rui Trick-or-Treating. Gyutaro let Daki put a pair of cat ears on him, and drew on some whiskers. "This is my favorite time of the year, I'm considered 'cool.'"

Daki: After the argument with Enmu, Daki entered a costume contest and came in second place. Daki then proceeded to steal the winners Halloween candy and destroy everything within the vicinity. Gyutaro had to take her back to the Infinity Castle early. "I will NOT settle second place, and I will NOT put up with some annoying COPYCAT!"

Akaza: Akaza wasn't expecting much from this 'party.' (Honestly he wasn't even gonna go, but he was ordered to.) Still, despite his reluctance, Daki put a pair of bear ears on him. Akaza spent the entire night trying not to burst out laughing until they were all permitted to leave. Akaza will never forget this Halloween. "Just...let me have this, Kokushibo."

Muzan: Muzan did not and would not dress up. Muzan claimed the concept of Halloween was too childish and would not participate. This confused the demons because they thought Muzan was the one who made them attend. He decapitated Douma. "Hello people who do not live here."

Kokushibo: He didn't dress up either, and Daki was too scared to try making him wear bunny ears. "No, maybe next year."

Douma: Douma was in full agreement with Muzan. "The master dresses up as Michael Jackson all year long after all, he deserves a day off!" Douma spent Halloween regenerating his body. "HEY, I was being nice this time!"

Gyokko: This MF went as Bob Ross. No on really paid much attention to them, as everyone was too busy watching Douma get his azz beat. "It would be a lie for me to say I don't feel inspired by the scene before me."

Hantengu (main body): Hantengu was constantly terrified the entire night until a wandering Demon Slayer separated them. "Terrifying...Terrifying..."

Aizetsu: Since the clones were on a last minute mission, Aizetsu decided to dress up as the Grim Reaper. "It makes me upset that we have to work on the holidays, but what other choice do we have?"

Sekido: Sekido also found the idea of dressing up to be stupid, and yelled at the other clones for participating in it. Sekido later felt embarrassed for being one of the few not dressed up at the party. "Idiots...I AM SURROUNDED BY IDIOTS!"

Karaku: Karaku dressed up in a Scream costume and chased people into the woods straight to Urogi. "Nothing wrong with having a little fun tonight, right?"

Urogi: Urogi didn't dress up because he thought they were scary enough as it is. While they were out he and Karaku would chase people into the woods and see who could throw someone higher in the air. "HAHAHA! LETS SEE IF YOU CAN 'FLY' HIGHER THAN YOUR FRIEND DID!"

#halloween #demon slayer #urogi #aizetsu #karaku #sekido #gyokko #muzan kibutsuji #douma #kokushibo #gyutaro #kny daki #Rui #enmu tamio #kny

[danganronpa96]

Why didn't Ayano kill Chapter 4, since well….Senpai is her motive and well, I think she'd figure out pretty quickly that it's Senpai without having to see it?

What if there was a triple kill Chapter 5? Like dynamics wise and the trial itself? (DR69)

How would Yoshi likely react to the death of Mario, assuming Mario had Yoshi had a pet and all that?

Would the idea that after the explosion, the little killing game in the church would actually somehow continue but turn into a full blown killing game in the city?

How would the participants had reacted if Yuri had committed a murder?

Also, the Smiling Friends artstyle you managed to a T. It's really good and Pim looks so cute in it.

What if the entire cast was just Yuri cloned 16 times. What if Kaidou and Yuri have survived? How do pets work in a world of anthropomorphic animals? How did the participants not freak out that there were two anthropomorphic animals? Why do I have so many questions?

Anyways um, York again, loved Chapter 4. Sorry for the horde of questions again.

Hello 101 questions /lh

1. This one is pretty obvious. Ayano made a promise to Luigi in chapter 3 she would try her hardest to get the trust of others and help them out. She even showcased this during the chapter 3 trial when she was being falsely accused with her secret exposed. Ayano went onto be distrusted regardless, but remained determined to keep herself in line. She knew her Senpai would be the focus of any motive featuring loved ones, but that wouldn’t stop her from her promise. After all, trying to kill a situation like this always pertained the possibility of herself dying, and in that scenario she would not be able to protect her Senpai at all.

2. I don’t know, it depends who would die. I could see Parappa getting involved somehow, but not anyone else (unless Ayano decided to go to the 5th floor too). So it’d either be Fluttershy/Parappa/Ayano or Fluttershy/Parappa/Brian. I think the trial would become more complex, but also since three bodies would leave three times as many clues behind… it could go either way.

3. The Yoshi would be very sad, but I’m sure Luigi would go onto adopt it for Mario.

4. Not really. That wasn’t what I was going for in the story. The whole ‘new killing game’ was just meant to be a cop out to a) introduce Matt into the gang and b) introduce Gumi and how I wanted to portray her character. But it does sound interesting regardless.

5. The majority of them wouldn’t be surprised. Natsuki would feel upset and betrayed Yuri went the full way with it. Although, I’m not sure she would consider it as most people would suspect her in a trial (unless this was before she revealed her philosophy).

6. Thank you!! I think I can draw Charlie a bit better than Pim but I’m happy to hear you liked how I drew him too ^^

7. a) The Yuri’s would be very freaked out. One would snap first but you can’t ask me to identify who because, you know, they all look the same.

b) Kaidou may do a similar thing I described in this post (and by that I just mean from the 3rd paragraph about the bandages and down, as a sign of maturing). Yuri on the other hand would become like a typical DR antagonist, who’d have some moments in the trials but ultimately tries to skew things in the wrong direction in order to help let the killer win.

c) You ask the Bojack Horseman universe the same thing because I have no idea. Or maybe ask the MLP universe because it works with Fluttershy. I guess it depends on the theme of animals (if they’re all different animals then no pets).

d) Well Hayasaka and Kurumada did get a bit concerned at Retsuko at first, but just went along to accept it come meeting Bojack (slightly) because they all woke up on an island with no recollection why at this point they could start levitating and assume it’s all one big group hallucination or social experiment.

e) man I don’t know holmes you tell me

Hello again! I’m happy to hear you enjoyed ch4!! And thanks for the assortment of questions lol

#definitely what you may call a mixed bag #more on 7d #some characters like Saiki would just accept it knowing what he’s seen #and Jesse just assumed he’s high at first #Natsuki probably mistook Bojack for an actual furry in a costume at first #but once they met Monotora it really was all jover for those ideas

[writesailingdreams]

One Piece episode 1099

ahoy, spoiler thoughts below!

Kaku amused me. I vibe with his enthusiasm.

Seeing the numbered doors for the Seraphim was neat. I don't remember if that was in the manga or not, but it presents some idea of potential order of creation and/or access to whatever is needed to create Seraphim.

I was weirdly curious about the workers on Egghead. Like, as far as I understand, those are just civilian scientists and researchers. So, (1) I'm interested in what those people do on Egghead, and (2) fascinated with how initially there was a sense of "kick his ass, Atlas" when, technically, those are top government agents! After, Lucci had struck Atlas, someone did question why a government agent was attacking, but up to that point -- it seemed the sentiment "you don't mess with us." Even if you're from the government! What kind of scientists and researchers are these!

On that note, the attack on Atlas was more upsetting here than in the manga to me. It seemed...more vicious? I don't know if it was the sparks and such, but it seemed a little more horrible.

And on that note, I found the mechanical/robotic nature of Atlas really interesting. Lucci calls her a clone, but it doesn't seem like a lot of the Vegapunks are entirely flesh and blood. Of course, clone, in the context of One Piece, may have different meaning. It's that bloodline element, I think, that sounds like DNA and can be copied and manipulated. Unless I'm mixing up the bloodline element and the Germa science. Hmmm, need to refresh up on One Piece science.

I feel like I had one or two other thoughts, but I can't think of them right now.

Maybe something like how, it would be weird to be watching One Piece now without background info, and yet it provides background info. Though some of it is refresher info, too.

Also, surprisingly very little actually happened this episode.

Oh! I did think the evacuation of the CP0 and co. was clearer here than in the manga. But again, I'm not sure if that's just because I don't remember the event clearly now or if it actually was clearer.

Okay. I think that's all.

#opspoilers #op spoilers #one piece episode 1099 #vegapunk #vegapunk atlas #rob lucci #kaku #cp0 #egghead arc #wsd watches one piece #one piece science #seraphim #one piece seraphim #one piece

[dangraccoon]

Oyuba'din - Chapter 6: Trust

Original Character & The Bad Batch

Summary: Echo tries to pry information from Tech. Jaine overhears something and wanders away.

Warnings: not really any; maybe trust issues if you squint and tilt your head

Author’s Note: Thank you everyone for your ongoing support! I started a new job the other day, so updates won’t come quite as often, so make sure you join my taglist so you can get notified when I update!! We’re starting to get into Jaine’s background now; hang on tight!

« Previous Chapter Next Chapter »

“Spill it, Tech,” Echo muttered, poking at the aforementioned clone with his foot.

“Spill what?” Tech asked, not looking away from the underside of the control panel in the cockpit.

“You don’t think Jaine’s from Naboo. Why?”

Tech paused his work. “There is no record of her living there prior to about ten years ago.”

“What? Why would she lie?”

“I am unsure,” he concluded.

“Either of you possibly think she’s hiding her past for a reason?” Hunter asked, stepping into the cockpit.

“If there is some part of her history that could cause future harm to the squad, she must tell us,” Tech explained.

“Maybe she doesn’t trust us,” Hunter argued, crossing his arms.

“She’s been with us for months, we have proven ourselves to be reliable in the field.”

“That isn’t everything, Tech,” murmured Echo. “I mean, what do we actually know about her? Have any of us had a conversation with her about anything other than work?”

Tech and Hunter’s expressions fell into twin scowls.

“She is rather skilled at having us open ourselves to her, yet not reciprocating. Perhaps this is something to be addressed with her in a…professional manner.”

Hunter and Echo exchanged a glance.

“Tech, I can’t order her to open up about her past. Besides, she could just as easily pull rank on me.”

“I can try to talk to her,” Echo suggested. “I mean, if her past could come back to haunt her we should know, right?”

“And just which part of my past that you know nothing about do you think will haunt me?” Jaine asked, gruffly from the doorway.

The three men startled a little, and Hunter placed his forehead in his hand. She looked between her squadmates, irritation evident on her normally cheerful face.

“Sorry, I’ll leave so you can keep speculating about my history,” she grunted, holding up a hand as Hunter tried to explain. “Save your breath, sergeant.”

Jaine skulked away, throwing a curt “don’t follow me” over her shoulder before stepping off the ship.

Crosshair growled a little as she brushed past him. “What the hell did you say?” he asked with a scowl.

————————————————

“Jainey, where you goin’?” Wrecker called as she stormed off towards the edge of the forest nearby where they had set down. “I was thinking we could play a game or something.”

“Sorry, Wreck, not right now,” she mumbled.

She picked up her pace so Wrecker wouldn’t see how upset she was. She knew if that big goofball got ahold of her and asked what was wrong, she wouldn’t be able to keep it together.

These past few months she had learned to trust these men. It was hard. She missed Cody’s steady leadership and the organization of a typical unit. But after two months of fighting alongside them, healing their injuries, talking with them, laughing with them, to find out they didn’t trust her like she trusted them? It was devastating.

Jaine tried to keep her eyes from spilling over as she rushed through the woods. What do I have to do? she thought. How many times do I have to prove myself to them?

As her pace slowed to a stop when she reached a small clearing next to a pond. She sunk down onto a rock and her tears began to fall when she heard a branch snap behind her, followed by a hiss of annoyance. Her head whipped around to face the threat. Jaine was fully prepared to go off on Echo, so she was thoroughly surprised when it wasn’t the ARC trooper behind her, but the sniper.

“Crosshair?” she whimpered in her confusion. “They sent you after me?”

Crosshair huffed. “They didn’t send me,” he mumbled.

Jaine didn’t respond at first; she didn’t know how to. Crosshair was by far the most standoff-ish member of the team, if not the whole GAR.

“They didn’t send you?”

“That’s what I said,” Crosshair said, eyes rolling as his arms crossed over his chest.

“You followed me of your own free will?” she asked dumbly.

Crosshair growled, but didn’t move.

“Why?”

Crosshair scoffed. “Why what?”

“Why did you follow me? You’ve hated me from the first day we met,” she explained.

Crosshair seemed to consider this. She had thought that maybe he was icy with everyone, but after watching him interact with his brothers, she knew that cool, rude demeanor was intended only for her. “I don’t,” he said simply.

Her brows knit together.

“I don’t hate you,” he repeated, softly.

She eyed him suspiciously, but scooted to the side of the rock, patting the newly available space. He took it after a moment, arms still crossed.

“They’re stupid,” he breathed, what felt like hours later.

“What?”

“My brothers,” he clarified. “Bunch of idiots.”

“Oh,” she said awkwardly.

“You’ve proven yourself to us, several times. If that doesn’t earn you the benefit of the doubt,” he trailed off, scowling at the small pond in front of them.

The pair fell into silence, not quite comfortable, just tense.

“Are you going to at least tell me?” She heard him ask. It wasn’t angry or upset, but almost genuinely curious. The statement reminded her of Tech for a fleeting moment.

Jaine took a huge breath in, slowly pushing it back out.

“Qoljak,” she whispered. “I was born on Qoljak.”

Crosshair’s mind raced. She had actually trusted him with this. He’d never heard of the planet.

“Why would you keep that a secret?”

Jaine sniffled miserably. “Because I’m the reason it died.”

Thanks for reading! - Dang

« Previous Chapter Next Chapter »

Masterlist

Taglist & Request Form

Read on Ao3

Requests are OPEN!

Current Request Queue: 0

Tags: @writing-positivelyexisting @nekotaetae @lokigirlszendaya @get-wr3ckered

#fanfiction #the bad batch #bad batch #tbb #tech tbb #hunter tbb #echo tbb #wrecker tbb #crosshair tbb #the bad batch fan fiction #bad batch fanfiction #oc tbb #oc #original character #Jaine Vale #dangwriting #Oyuba'din #Original Character #OC #oc the bad batch #oc bad batch #the bad batch x oc #poly!batch x OC #no clonecest #hunter x oc #tech x oc #wrecker x oc #crosshair x oc #echo x oc #DangWriting

[dragonmuse]

@internerdionality replied: I would love to see a crossover-y Christmas Carol kinda story with this Lucius, where he gets to see what his life could have been. Would he think the other Lucii were chumps, or start to realize what he’s missing?

I was immediately visited by the vision of a ring of chairs in a basement ala AA with various versions of Lucius sitting around drinking shitty coffee. This barely a thing, just made me giggle. So behold my ridiculous little shadowplay.

Mainverse Lucius leads the meetings (he's the most fleshed out, visibly has more dimension and shadow etc) calls things to order. Most of them are dressed in a fairly similar way, but the further they sit from Mainverse, the more the subtle differences add up, terminating in May Be Bad who sits directly opposite him in a truly outstandingly expensive gray suit with a deep purple vest and crisp white shirt. The person closest to him is Wake Myself in the Shadows and he is constantly trying to scoot slightly further away from him and closer to Bottle of Red, who just watches them both warily.

Mainverse: Okay, so we have a lot of new faces since our last meeting...like a lot a lot. Like a troubling amount, but whatever. We'll just go along do intros again and the basic survey so we can break into small group discussion.

They all say their 'verse names pretty quickly.

Mainverse: Great. Ok. So married to Pete?

Most of the hands go up, the ones that don't tend be further from Mainverse and he makes a few notes.

Mainverse: Sucks to be you assholes. Ok, married, but not to Pete?

Most remaining hands go up.

Mainverse: Keep 'em up if it's Izzy....okay cool. No one's gone totally rogue yet, love that for us. Additional love interests...that's a question now? We're adding shit? Fuck, fine. Who's got...Faith? Really?

One hand. Everyone takes a second to appreciate I Know a Place, who is noticeably older and clearly very relaxed.

Mainverse: Okay then, I have so many questions to ask you. Actually, the whole Faith lives group, let's have a group sesh before the dreamstate dissolves, please and thank you. Let's see...oooh Eddy? Really?

Take a Stand: She's pretty great.

Mainverse: Sure to poke with a stick.

You're Awful: A pointy one.

Mainverse: Right okay....

How 'bout Another: She is my metamour, I'm into it.

You're Awful: She's mine and I want to murder her.

Mainverse: Annnd let's make another adjustment to the seating chart, you two should not be next to each other. Let's see....fuck. No. No fucking way. Please tell me which one of you assholes did this so I can kick your fucking teeth in.

Bottle of Red *still inching away*: I don't even know what you're talking about and I could take an educated guess.

Mainverse: Which one of you fucking clones is in a relationship with CHARLIE?

Wake Myself in the Shadows: HEY! It's age adjusted and I didn't meet him until he was in his twenties.

*general grossed out noises, You're Awful throws an empty coffee cup at him*

I May Be Bad: Don't be shy. Charlie is delicious and you all are very much missing out. Morals are such an annoyance.

Bottle of Red: Can I switch seats? With literally anyone?

You're Awful: We could just throw him out.

I May Be Bad: *draws out dagger and starts cleaning nails with it* Darling, I'd love to see you try.

In silent agreement, everyone scoots their chairs away and Bottle of Red even lets Wake Myself get a little closer.

Mainverse: Okay, forget small groups. Now I think we all need to know what your deal is in particular.

Just Like a One Winged: He doesn't have an Izzy, right? Or a Phil?

Feels Just Like I'm Falling: Pete.

I May Be Bad: I'm married to Izzy, thanks very much.

Bottle of Red: Is that just what no Pete looks like cause uh...

Just Like a One Winged and Somewhere Only We know: Fuck no.

I May Be Bad: I really don't see what you're all so upset about. I just live like all the rest of you wish you could. I don't worry about what other people think of me.

Mainverse: Uh, a little worry would be good, Mr. Pointy Things. Okay, let's run down where this went horribly awry. You're not age shifted. ...oh. You met Izzy when you were 19?!

I May be Bad: I met Jim first. They met Izzy and Eddy at 19 too. Why? Didn't you all?

Mainverse: No, babe, no we did not. Jim first is a new one.

I May be Bad: *clearly agitated* are you fucking serious? You all...you really just paired up with Pete of all fuckers and Izzy and that's it? No Jim? No business?

Somewhere Only: I mean, no clear attachment to sharp implements either.

I May Be Bad: This is so fucked up.

Mainverse: Really really really think that's you and not us. Holy shit. Do we have a dis-invite option? This vibe is rancid.

I May Be Bad: You think I want to be here? You can miss me with this shit.

Wake Me in the Shadows: Listen, I think we're all a little heated.

You're Awful: No shit.

Things only get more heated. Much arguing ensues, no one breaks into small groups before the dream dissolves and luckily no on remember anything in the morning.

#I'm not even tagging this fever dream moment

[elvesandlanterns]

Kon’s Interlude - Ghost Helpline

Warning: depictions of war, meat eating and throwing up

Konstelacio tries to leave the Watchtower as soon as she entered it. She tried. Two hours later she leaves and erases the summoning circle behind her. She hopes they never call her again as she teleports home.

She has enough energy to teleport it’s fine.

She lands on her ass and stares at the pink carpet. Ugh. Everything in her corner of the house was too fucking bright right now.

“Hello!!! I’m back!!!! … Guys? … Dad?”

Throb. throb. throb.

Bile burned its way up her throat.

Was this it ? Did they leave me? Did Uncle Dan tell them how she’d managed to fuck up without even trying?

“Bbblluubbb???”

Oh a blob ghost.

Right a blob ghost, “Hahaah I’m an idiot of course daddy wouldn’t leave me.” They wouldn’t leave me. At least not Dad and that was enough. It had to be enough.

“Bbbllubbb. Bbb. B. Blurrrb.”

“Haha right! Thanks for sending me the message! Tell dad I love him and can’t wait to see him! And Billy if Billy’s back by now make sure to give him a big soggy hug for me okay!”

“Bbblubb!!” The little slimy looking ball swished its head to hers in what was most likely meant to be a love tap but ended up little more that the creature splaying itself entirely onto her forehead. It left, Violet felt lonely.

Lonely and dumb. How could she forget her family was moving into their new house today?

It explained where everyone was, the empty fridge and missing items. Right, Dad needed this move. He needed, well Violet wasn’t sure what he needed exactly but Dandy said he did. And Violet trusted Dandy. She trusted him with this at least. It was enough.

She smelled something rotting in her nose.

It was enough.

It was enough.

It was enough.

She walked back to her room and looked around. Nobody had packed her things. Her throat burned. She’d fill a bag tomorrow and figure it out.

She laid down in her bed in her room of her dads house.

// “This is mine? Really mine? It’s too pretty. What if I break it?”

“It’s yours, it’s okay. If it breaks I’ll buy you a new one baby I am rich remember?”

“This room is mine too?”

“Yes of course.”

“What it I break it to? What if I break it on purpose.”

“I’m giving it to you, no strings attached. If breaking everything in your room makes you happy then do it. I won’t be mad, because it’s yours okay?”

“Are you mine too then, Dad? You’re mine?”

“Yes”

“What if I break you to?”

“I’ll heal.” //

Konstelacio’s breathing slowed, eyes drooping. It was more than she had ever had before. I was more than she deserved. She smiled cuddled up to her mountain of stuffed animals. It was enough.

—- —- —-

Konner, Conner, Kon-El, Superboy, clone, Kon, clone, Konny, clone, clone boy, it.

So yeah Konner got it. Kon (ha!) stelacio had a write to be upset at Constantine for calling her something she didn’t like. She had apparently asked him not to and he had. Apart of Conner hoped Constantine got cursed. That guy was an asshole.

He gets the snapping defeat of her name, the anger. Conner knew anger well. Something about her made his insides twist. Something in her voice screaming, help me help me something is wrong. He shakes his head and decides to tell Black Canary about it at therapy.

It took a lot of time, and a lot of therapy for Conner to feel okay with himself. With his looks, his voice. Being a clone left him with a lot of self doubt about everything. Where did Superman end and Conner start?

Superboy thought back on the bargaining the league had done over the cure for Vampires Fog and couldn’t help but laugh. Well it was nice to know he at least had a soul in which to barter with now.

Conner gave himself a once over in the mirror before floating out the door. Time for a date with Tim.

—- —- —-

// War was surprisingly boring. When not fighting for their lives all war mounted up to was waiting. Waiting for the next battle, waiting for a chance to wash your bloody clothes, waiting for new orders, waiting for food, waiting for resources, waiting, waiting, waiting. War was boring.

General Dan was angry today. They didn’t have food … again. Violet wasn’t allowed to go hunting and Klarion had decided to stay with her. The mix species battalion had decimated the surrounding area for food a week ago.

Klarion was use to emotional hunger, the physical ache in his stomach rendering the talkative sprite speechless.

Billy was use to physical hunger just fine, telling them stories of Faucet cities kind people with a smile but something about the lack of food had begun to make him twitchy.

Violet was use to both kinds of hunger, so it didn’t matter.

“Billy’s back!!! Violet get up! Look he brought food!”

“There you guys are! Here eat up!”

The trio sat down near their tent. It’s natural for demons to eat meet uncooked, Violet had told Billy multiple times. She didn’t want to be a bother. Half the meat was burnt, no bones and definitely no blood.

Violet ate three bowls anyway. The meat was vividly red enough to play off as blood. It was chewy and sweet and charred in a way the stuck to the back of her throat. It smelled weird and familiar. Then again all burning flesh smelled familiar.Pieces of it kept getting stuck in the back of her throat. Meat wasn’t usually sweet like this. It was juicy, the demons mouth watered as she wondered.

How did they get this? She almost couldn’t believe they had found more game in the woods. It was sweet, Violet knew a type of sweet meat. Sweet blood. Were…. Were they eating a vampire?

Klarion finish off one before looking out into the forest and grimacing.

“Billy Billy you need to eat to!!! You’re a human you need to eat.”

“Of course Vi I am don’t worry. It’s delicious! Some of my best cooking yet. Mmm yum it’s great.”

Right they couldn’t be eating a vampire, humans can’t do that. Whatever Klarion was probably couldn’t eat vampires ether.

Klarion followed Billy’s lead “Yumming and oooing” until the little demonling finished off two more bowls.

Billy stood up to wash the bowls. The air shifted allowing the girl to get a good wiff of the blood on humans pants.

“Horse blood? Are the horses okay? What happened?”

The trio had grown close to their steeds, gifts of their political party, riding them gave the kids an illusion of freedom. Combing, feeding and playing with them had helped the days go faster.

Violet got up and began to look - really look around the campsite. “Billy? Billy? Where’s Fireball? You took him with you hunting right were is he?”

A look crossed both of the boys faces, Klarion downed his tea like it was alcohol. Maybe it was.

“General Dan is bringing the horses back in few hours Vi Vi don’t worry about it.”

True to his word, General brought the horses back and Violet understood were all of the bones must have went.

Everything tasted like ash until the war was over.//

Violet woke up puking.

She wanted her dad, her dad was in Gotham.

She teleported.

#danny phantom #batman #justice league #dc x dp #dp x dc #redeemed vlad #ghost helpline #billy batson #@busterkeel #@alikoyuii #@mayoota blog1 #@roseisred #@starkcravingmad #@icedbluesoul #@vixen uichah #@mimilikey #@dodekakophonie #@tonystarkstripper #fireball the horse

[kimageddon]

Hey I wanted to thank you for your comments on the long thread about Phee/Tech and neurodivergence, etc. You managed to put into words what I couldn't about posts of that nature and why they were bothering me; I've mostly just blocked them rather than try to articulate what didn't sit right. Neurodivergence is a large spectrum and I think it's easy for everyone to assume a given ND character's experiences must align with theirs, rather than acknowledging it's going to work for some of us and not others, and that's all part of being a large, diverse group of people whose life experience at the hands of neurotypical society is going to be radically variant.

Hello Anon!

Thank you kindly for such a lovely message! I am very glad that I was able to say something. You may regret sending this, because I am jumping back on my soapbox.

I'm gonna talk about Autism, ND, mental health as it relates to Tech and the Bad Batch.

This is gonna be another long one:

For clarification, if anyone needs it, my message in the aforementioned thread was to offer a different perspective as the arguments did not make sense to me. I wanted to talk about the show and not about the people having the opinions.

I wanna clarify that my comments in regard to Autism being different was not to dismiss the experiences of anyone ND but to specify that while perhaps you(anyone reading this) would find the comment "it's called a conversation" upsetting (I know I would if it were said to me!).

However I do not think Tech would.

My reasoning is this:

Autism is treated differently in men and women and men (generally speaking) are not pressured to mask as much. (They still are, but not to the level of women from everything my research tells me.)

That being said, Tech has not really had to do that from the evidence I have seen. He Info dumps, interjects, and pretty much acts with confidence throughout the time we see him. Why would he need to mask? He was created to be a well of information and his brothers more or less accept him as he is.

To the argument that Phee somehow controls or manipulates or otherwise pushes her self on Tech in any manner.

I think that is ridiculous.

Firstly, she is gentle and kind when she speaks to him, if a little sassy. Nothing Tech hasn't encountered before from his brothers, or even dished out himself.

Hunter's introduction to us of Tech is: "He can fill your head with useless info for hours."

Which is probably the most dismissive thing said to him in the time we get to know him, but that just doesn't bother him.

In relation to this, people saying things like this are at risk of infantalising him. Which is a major problem within the Autistic and ND community.

Secondly. Tech is a grown ass man (weird clone aging aside). If he didn't like Phee or something she says, he can walk away, and I believe he would. He doesn't appear to feel the societal pressures, he's a soldier and doesn't get civilian etiquette so why would he follow it and stand around her just to be polite?

"Since when have we ever followed orders?"

We aren't children.

We might think differently and process differently, but we are people. We're not poor widdle babies that don't understand our feelings. We don't need protecting from the world and people that wanna treat Tech that way are doing he and the Autistic people that identify with him a massive disservice.

Finally, I wanted to clarify the part of my message that seemed to be the most controversial.

If something is so deeply upsetting that it affects your mental health detrimentally perhaps you need to look at your life and disengage from said thing.

From what I gather, some people have interpreted this to mean : just don't watch the Bad Batch. or "it's just a stupid show why do you care?"

This is not what I mean.

Of course care about it, get engaged with the characters and the story and let it make you feel things.

What this message means is:

If something -- whether it be a piece of media, a person/relationship, a social platform --

Is so deeply upsetting that it effects your mental health detrimentally -- if you have trouble sleeping or thinking about anything else or fall into depressive states (not depression generally speaking but because of the something specifically) and you cannot function at your usual level --

Perhaps you need to look at your life -- true happiness comes from within (i'll get to this in a sec) --

And disengage with said thing -- take a break, take a breath, drink water, have a snack. Let your emotions process and let yourself relax, then you can go back to it (provided of course it's not a toxic situation.) --

I realise this is far easier said than done, and it would take a significant amount of introspection, but I use this in multiple situations, not just here.

The TL:DR version; go touch grass, you'll feel better.

Alright, we've strayed a little from the point

Finally: Ship and let ship.

If you don't like Phee because you prefer to write Tech as not liking anyone but y/n or your OC -- go for it! That's totally valid! (They did it with Anakin so why not?) Besides, there were only a few interactions and it was a budding closeness, it's not like Tech was getting married to her!

But if you wanna make excuses that you only like the actress when she's not a direct romantic threat to your blorbo or do some mental gymnastics to try and portray her interactions as toxic, and he "deserves better" my dude, that reeks of something else entirely.

I decided to cut it here as it's getting a little longer than intended and I wanted to keep this to Tech/Bad Batch related stuff. I will make a post explaining the more controversial takes that apparently upset some people.

That should be interesting.

Again, thank you anon for the kind message, and giving me an opportunity to further clarify my thoughts.

If anyone has any questions or counterpoints, I would be interested to hear them.

#kima answers #hot take #the bad batch #tech #phee genoa #clarification #autism #neurodivergent