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queen-scribbles · 2 years

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Minefield

Mid-game, early-ish relationship Evony/Bao Dur fic bc I was hit by a dialogue snippet that I couldn’t shake and had to write 2300 words to go around it. xD

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Evony didn’t remember much about Dxun--whether because so much had happened during the Mandalorian Wars it all blurred together or because she’d repressed it--but she was surprised she’d forgotten the insects. Mostly small, nearly constant, and annoying. The reprieve offered by the blown-open Mandalorian cache was welcome beyond words. And she could feel the matching waves of relief from Mira and Bao Dur as well. She wondered briefly how much of a mental--or vocal--storm Atton was cursing up having to work on the exterior of the Hawk.

“I vote we take our time searching this place,” Mira said, likely only half-joking.

“Seconded,” Evony laughed, smacking the side of her neck to deal with the lone buzzing peril that had followed her in.

Bao Dur caught her arm when she started to follow Mira down the short entrance hall. “A wise decision for more reasons that one,” he said, nodding at the floor.

Upon closer inspection, the way in was littered with mines

Evony wrinkled her nose and laughed sheepishly. “I keep forgetting that signal dampener of hers.... Nice catch.”

He tipped his head in a combination of silent gratitude and ‘of course’, then knelt to examine the nearest device. “It appears the Mandalorians were paranoid about someone raiding their weapons caches.”

“I mean... are we not doing that?” she pointed out, crouching next to him and cocking her head. She was hardly the demolitions expert he was, but even to her... “That does look... more complex.”

“Larger yield explosive, more delicate trigger mechanism. Good eye,” Bao Dur said, approval flickering in his eyes. “And I feel we’re well enough outfitted from our... journeys so far without adding Mandalorian weapons to the stockpile.” He set to work dismantling the mine. “But if you and Mira want to go digging for any surprises, I won’t stop you.”

The mines might, Evony thought dryly as she watched him work. “I think I’d rather learn how to do that first” --she nodded toward the half-apart mine-- “seems more valuable than anything I could find in here. And currently I only know enough to deal with minor explosives.”

He finished with the current one and carefully stored it for later use(which made her arch a brow). “I can show you, if you really wish to learn, General.”

Evony nodded. “I should. In case there’s ever a point I need to do so and don’t have you around to help.” Not that she could fathom a scenario without him at her side now that she had him back. Or wanted to. She lightly shoulder-checked him, now that he wasn’t working on something that could kill them both in a blink. “And I told you; I’m not a general anymore, you can use my name.”

Bao Dur hummed a small, apologetic laugh. “You did. Old habits and all, but I’ll work on it.”

“So long as you’re trying, I’ll forgive you,” she teased as they shifted to the next mine.

“We should start with disabling, it’s less complicated, and move on to recovering them once you have the hang of that.”

“I appreciate the confidence I’ll get the hang of it,” Evony said. She positioned herself where she could see but wouldn’t be in his way.

“Of course you will, it’s similar to tinkering and repair work and you are a very quick study if memory serves,” Bao Dur replied. “I’ve no doubt that will hold true for this as well.”

She smiled at his confidence and made sure to pay close attention so she could justify it.

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By the time they finished unmining the hallway and main entry space to the cache, Mira had already made half a circuit of the space.

“Someone’s eager,” Evony murmured with a quiet laugh as she stood, instinctively bracing herself against Bao Dur’s shoulder when her leg cramped and made her wobble.

“Or just enjoying the break from swarming insects,” he said dryly. He waited to be sure she had her balance before standing as well. He ran a look over the floor of the cache and shook his head. “How many mines did they need?”

Evony frowned as she followed his gaze and caught the generous scattering of explosives around the small space. “I’ll let you handle this minefield without having to instruct me,” she said glibly, patting his shoulder. “I feel like it’ll go faster that way.”

He gave a short, mirthless chuckle. “Still going to take a while if we need to do the whole thing.” A small smile in her direction. “And you are, as expected, a fast learner, G- Evony.”

She smiled in return. “Thank you. I have a good teacher. That helps.”

“Hey, Jedi, come look at this,” Mira called from halfway across the room, digging through a storage locker.

Evony paused a moment to confirm there was a clear path to join her, then gave Bao Dur’s arm a gentle squeeze as she stepped away. Her lips were still pulled in a slight smile from his praise when she reached Mira. “What did you find?”

“Here.” Mira turned from the locker and held out a double-blade lightsaber hilt. “Kind of a surprise to find in a Mandalorian cache, but maybe somebody kept it as a trophy, you know?”

“Mm-hm.” Evony bit her lip in thought as she took the hilt. Double-bladed wasn’t her preference, but Visas still needed a replacement for hers, or parts to repair it, so this would come in handy. She briefly ignited it and the blue blades hummed to life. After a quick test of the balance, she deactivated it and clipped it to her belt by one of her own ‘sabers. “Good find.”

“Thanks.”

When she looked up, Mira was glancing between her and Bao Dur with a slowly growing smirk. “What?”

“Just piecing together that I was wrong,” Mira said, the storage locker forgotten as she studied Evony.

“About...?” Evony prompted cautiously. Despite the brevity of their acquaintance, it wasn’t hard to figure out that Mira smirking was dangerous.

“When I thought you and Atton, y’know, hooked up a power coupling.” She settled her weight in one leg and sent a significant look across the cache. “Shoulda pegged you as someone to go more for the quiet type.”

“We haven’t either!” Evony protested, face going hot. She darted her own glance at Bao Dur to check if he’d noticed the outburst. Looked like no. “Any glow or contentment you think you see is completely and only from reestablishing my connection to the Force, not... hooking up a power coupling with anyone.”

“Maybe so,” Mira said, tone far too casual, before turning a sharp, victorious smile her way. “But that was an awful vehement denial this time. “

And Evony felt herself cartwheel headfirst into the very trap she’d been trying to avoid, a trap she should have seen coming. “Stars forbid I get flustered at the assumptions I’m sleeping with my friends,” she said tartly, wishing she still held the lightsaber hilt so she had something else to focus on than Mira’s triumphant smirk as she she tried to salvage some of her dignity.

“Friends?” Mira parroted with a skeptically arched brow. “Okay, I’ll buy that for Atton; he doesn’t strike me as your type. But, Evony. I don’t need to be a Jedi to see how cozy you and Bao Dur looked during your... minefield decommissioning back there.” She nodded toward the entrance. “Or how often--and long--you talk to him on the ship. Or that you always want him to come along--and he doesn’t exactly protest.”

“It’s not- I-” Evony sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. This conversation was proving as much of a minefield as the cache entrance. “We’re... old friends, Mira. I trust him more than anyone. We went through a lot together during the Mandalorian Wars, hard things, the sort that forge bonds. He served under me at Malachor, and that memory alone is a wound it’s hard to talk about with anyone who wasn’t there.”

“I get that, believe me.” Mira leaned back in to continue searching the locker. “But are you really saying there’s no attraction there?”

Evony wrinkled her nose, hesitated long enough to be an answer on its own, then muttered, “No, that’s not what I’m saying.”

Mira pulled back out of the locker so fast she almost banged her head on the edge. “Wait, what?!”

Evony arched a brow at her. “After all that prodding and hinting are you really surprised you’re right?”

“No, I’m surprised you’re admitting to it,” Mira corrected. “What with your vehement denial a minute ago and all.”

“Acknowledging attraction and... shifting a friendship romantic is a little more delicate than just ‘hooking up a power coupling’, more like...”

“Navigating a minefield?” Mira supplied wryly, shooting a look at where Bao Dur was still working to disarm the explosives littering the cache. “You picked the right partner for that.”

Evony huffed a quiet laugh. “I tend to agree. We’re just... moving slowly. Being careful. Making sure what we feel is truly attraction and not just... latching on to an old friend with shared pain and misjudging what it means. We both value our friendship too much to watch it go up in flames because we jumped the gun.”

“Still, with... everything going on, you might wanna be careful how slow you take it, you know?” Mira said, cracking open another locker to search.

“I’ve thought about that, believe me. And so has he.” Evony leaned back against the wall. Her security bypassing skills were only marginally better than her demolitions skills, so it was best if she just let Mira work. Even if it would bring teasing about Jedi weaknesses. “We don’t want to let caution become cowardice any more than we want to rush things. It’s a hard balance, especially given we’re both cautious by nature.” More than worth it, in her opinion, she thought with a smile.

“Mm.” Mira rummaged through the locker but was empty handed when she shut the door. “Good luck figuring that out. Afraid my usual advice about men doesn’t apply.”

“Thanks all the same,” Evony said with a smile.

Mira nodded. “Not that you need any advice,” she said drolly, finagling open a crate. “You have good tastes.”

“Again, thanks.” Evony leaned in to examine the crate’s contents. Medpacs and shields, which they already had in abundance. She didn’t bother pointing out her past as a Jedi was hardly fraught with romantic experience and any advice was still welcome. Depending on the source. “Think it’s worth taking any of this stuff?”

“Medpacs are always worth having, but I think we’re fine on shields,” Mira replied, already piling the medpacs on the floor. She smirked a little. “And if we run out, your boyfriend can practically make them in his sleep.”

“That’s not-” Evony sighed, face warming again. She really needed to figure out when Mira was baiting and stop falling for it.

“Terminology another of those minefields?” Mira asked with amusement dancing in her eyes.

Evony wrinkled her nose, “Something like that. We care about each other a lot, there’s definitely a... bond there, different and tighter than any other I’ve formed, but even if I had to label it, I don’t think that’s the word I would pick.” It didn’t feel like enough to convey the true depth of their connection.

“Find anything good?”

She flinched, hard, at the sudden nearness of Bao Dur’s presence, than flashed him a sheepish smile. “Sorry, lost in thought. Didn’t notice you were done.”

“I could tell.” There was a quiet, gentle note of teasing in his voice as he stood close enough their arms almost brushed.

Evony bit her lip and lightly bumped his shoulder. “To answer your question, Mira found a lightsaber--I was thinking Visas could use it--and a whole slew of medpacs. I’ve mostly just been here for conversation and moral support.”

“Both of which were appreciated,” Mira chipped in, tucking the medpacs in various belt pouches. “Fascinating conversation about minefields literal and metaphorical. Shame you missed it.”

Evony shot her a brief warning look--which Mira ignored--before glancing back across the cache as she addressed Bao Dur. “All finished?”

“Much as I can,” he confirmed with a nod. “There are a few near the entrance that have begun succumbing to jungle atmosphere. They would likely detonate with any attempt to disarm them. If you wish to search that corner, Mira should handle it.”

“I feel so special,” Mira said glibly, and headed for the indicated corner.

Evony watched her go, slipping through the sensor range of the mines with ease to rifle the crates they protected. Wish I could navigate minefields so easily...

“What would you call it?” Bao Dur asked, his voice quieter even than usual. “I overheard a bit,” he explained when she shot him a questioning look. “If you had to label... what we have, what would you say?”

“My anchor,” she said without hesitation, then mulled over further elaboration because that still felt inadequate and she knew he wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important to him. “My... the eye of the storm. Calm and safe while chaos swirls around us. A chance to catch my breath and my balance, with no expectation to be anything other than myself.” She shifted her weight to lean in just enough their arms brushed as she confessed, softly, “Something I value more than a Jedi rightly should, I reckon.”

One side of his mouth pulled up, his fingers arching back to briefly link with hers, and he commented dryly, “Then I suppose it’s a good thing people keep insisting you’re no longer a Jedi.”

Evony snorted a laugh and leaned more firmly against his side. “Very true.”

Mira turned from the crates then, brandishing another double-hilt lightsaber and handful of grenades and computer spikes, and grinned at how close the two of them were standing. “Alright,” she said as she rejoined them, “I think we’ve gotten everything we can out of this place, so much as I hate to say it, you know what that means.”

Evony sighed. “Back out to the bugs.”

“Yep.” Mira smiled grimly. “After you.”

Evony turned toward the door, briefly smiled when Bao Dur Pressed his shoulder to hers in silent support, and led the way back out into the jungle.

#queens fic #evony xara #bao dur #mira #evony/bao dur #kotor2 #they figure out pretty early on there's something there #they just take the development very slowly #the l word doesn't even come up until after malachor v

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freckledbastard · 2 years

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?? darth sion coming outta left field and hitting the exile with the you're beautiful to me and that's why i hate you and my master will try to break you so i will kill you to spare your suffering like... what's he talking about lol didn't we only meet the one time

having said that tho,,, you know what i ship it. let him redeem himself and learn to heal and realise there IS more to life than pain

#kotor spoilers #kotor 2 #kotor 2 spoilers #listening to his monologue and im like sure lol why not i can ship this #forbidden love~ or whatever #what if we were enemies fighting on malachor v and we kissed haha just joking... unless?

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justaballoffluff · 11 months

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thinking about how one major reason Tari is so anxious and a bit paranoid sometimes is because she was witness to both the sudden destruction of so many people at once and the abandonment of what little clan she had left in the aftermath

like, yeah, of course she'd keep people at arms length, she's afraid that if she lets someone get close again they're gonna either die or leave on her. it's also why once she decides she cares about you, you're stuck with her. not in a clingy "you're never gonna be left alone ever again" sort of way, but in a "I would follow you to hell and back if you asked" way

#like Tari had an unwittingly front row seat to Malachor V #and after she was returned to her clan #and then everyone except Nef and Stella left #but then! she had an accident and a (near)death #which meant that when she woke up she had to deal with Nef's death and Stella's abandonment on her own!#my poor baby. I put her through so much

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ospreyeamon · 7 months

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the falls of the revanchist jedi

The narrative doesn’t directly examine why the Jedi who followed Revan and Malak fell. It is spoken of as a given – they followed Revan into war, so they followed Revan into darkness. That’s not how people work though. That’s not even how people under the influence of the Dark Side of the Force work. Spending twenty years as Palpatine’s thrall didn’t prevent Vader from throwing his Master into the reactor shaft to save his son. Revan can murder every NPC available to be murdered until reaching Rakata Prime only to pull a 180, redeem Bastila, and be feted as a hero of the Republic, Sith-eyes and all.

All but one of the surviving Revanchist Jedi who followed Revan and Malak into the Mandalorian Wars followed them again into the Jedi Civil War. Even the Exile, that lone dissenting actor, can say that they would have fought with their fellows against the Republic had their connection to the Force not been severed; that they were unable, not unwilling. Yet, the Exile can also say that they would not have followed Revan and Malak in attacking the Republic, that they went to war to defend the innocent. Many of the other Jedi who joined the war effort alongside them must have felt the same way, in the beginning.

Many of the soldiers of the Republic like Carth Onasi returned home after the Mandalorian Wars were over, even those like Saul Karath who would bow to Revan again. What then are the factors that led every surviving Revanchist Jedi, save the Exile, to follow Revan from the Mandalorian Wars into the Jedi Civil War?

1) The Mandalorian Wars changed the Jedi who fought in them. The Exile’s dialogue provides the different reasons why they might have left to fight in the war – to protect the innocent, to test their power, to defend the Republic, to win glory – reflecting varying motivations of Knights and Padawans recruited by Revan and Malak. However, despite the differences in the initial reasons for defying the Jedi Council to answer the Republic’s call, they all would have gone through similar uniting experiences during the war. Terrible experiences. Shared hardship often serves to reinforce group identity.

Older Jedi like Kavar and Arren Kae had fought wars before, but the initial expedition led by Revan and Malak was almost entirely composed of young Knights and older Padawans. Military morality, ethics in warfare, tends to be rather twisted from the perspective of modern western civilian morality. Your ability to prosecute the war and the safety of your soldiers takes priority over the lives of enemy, and sometimes even allied, civilians. Ruthless is more than a virtue, it’s a necessity. Collateral damage is an inevitability. For young relatively inexperienced Jedi, raised on ideals of valuing all life and always seeking non-violent resolutions, the transition to military command positions where they were not only required to kill, not only required to led troops to their death, but required to give orders which they knew would directly result in the deaths of civilians would have been distressing.

We know that the Exile once led troops directly into a minefield during the Battle of Dxun, but I think that barely scratched the surface. We aren’t given the full laundry list of the Mandalorians’ war crimes, but at the very least it includes the crime of aggression, murder of civilians, use of child soldiers, and conscription of captured civilians into the Neo-Crusaders and for forced labour. Given this disregard for the lives of civilians, I consider it likely that the Mandalorians also used hostages and headquartered themselves inside buildings like schools and hospitals. I suspect both sides used poison weapons, nuclear weapons, torture, and executed prisoners of war.

2) The Battle of Malachor V was a purge and a crucible of conversion. Kreia, HK-47, and the recording of Bastila Shan all say it; “a series of massacres that masked another war, a war of conversion”, “the intention was to destroy the Jedi, break their will, and make them loyal to Revan … Revan was "cleaning house" at Malachor V”, “to convert the last of the Jedi who fought beside [Revan] – and murder those who would not”. The Jedi in the radius of the Mass Shadow Generator would have included the Jedi Revan did not believe would agree with the plan to invade the Republic.

I think many of the Revanchist Jedi had already been falling by inches before Malachor. The Mandalorian Wars were brutal and one of the major symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is emotional dysregulation. Irritability, anxiety, depression, guilt, anger – the ongoing effects of trauma make a person more susceptible to inadvertently drawing on the Dark-Side of the Force. Using the Dark-Side of the Force was forbidden by the Code enforced by the Jedi Council, but the Revanchists had been pressured to compromise their ethics in other ways to effectively prosecute the war.

For any Jedi who had not already fallen, the detonation of the Mass Shadow Generator was a final blow they could not withstand. They all fell – into the Dark-Side, into death, away from the Force.

This was the conversion that Revan desired. The moral conversation – the acceptance of actions that violated their previous moral code, the previous moral code that would not have permitted making war on the Republic. The conversion in the Force – pushing Jedi to the Dark-Side ensured that they would not be accepted back into the Order by the Jedi Council even if they desired to return.

3) The Jedi Council’s decision to exile the Jedi who returned to face them was a gift to Revan and Malak. The Council’s judgement might have been rooted in their discomfort with what the Exile had become but the reason they publicly gave is that the Exile disobeyed the Council to follow Revan to war. That reason applied equally to every single other Revanchist. By exiling the one Revanchist to return the Jedi Council exiled them all, whether or not they intended to. They may not have, but by deciding to keep secret the true reasons behind their sentence of exile they ensured the other Revanchists could interpret their judgement no other way.

Telling the Revanchist Jedi they would never be welcome to return to the Jedi Order ensured that they would never go back. Onwards was the only path left to them.

4) Revan was extremely charismatic and competent. The Revanchist Jedi had already decided that Revan and Malak judgement was better than the Jedi Council’s when they chose to defy the Council’s orders to follow them to war. Revan, Malak and the Revanchists then won the war for the Republic. In fact, Revan even discovered the shadowy threat the which had been the Council’s justification for sitting out the war through engaging in it, while the Jedi Council remained ignorant.

The Republic government probably bungled the early stages of the Mandalorian Wars by not intervening sooner. The Mandalorians were committing more than enough war crimes for them to justify it, but they allowed Mandalorians to expand their territory, build their forces and industry, and entrench their advantage. When the Republic did enter the war, it wasn’t because the Republic leadership had made a strategic decision, or even a moral one; it was because some corrupt politicians organised bribes to fast-track Taris into the Republic because it was under threat and they wanted to protect their business holdings there. The Jedi Council was also tangled up in the culture of corruption; Lucien Draay was given a seat on the Council even though he’d been accused of planning and assisting the murder of four Padawans because of his powerful family connections.

The Old Republic was more an aristocratic republic than a democratic one. Alderaan, Onderon, the Empress Teta system – they were all monarchies during this period, not democracies. If aristocrats could hold power through right of blood and plutocrats through wealth, then why shouldn’t Revan lead the Galactic Republic by right of merit and conquest?

Revan was secretive, but at least some of the other Revanchist Sith knew about the shadowy threat – the True Sith Empire. If the Republic was going to need to fight another war against an even greater enemy, surely it would need better leadership. Leadership like Revan.

#Meanwhile in a Galaxy Far Far Away #kotor meta #Revanchist Jedi #Revanchist Sith #Revan #the Jedi Civil War #the Mandalorian Wars #the Battle of Malachor V #Darth Malak #The Jedi Exile #knights of the old republic #war crimes cw

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bh-52 · 1 year

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Starkiller's just chilling on Malachor

#star wars #galen marek #starkiller #malachor v

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luxettenebra · 1 year

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if Revan had a holocron, one she made for herself, there are several places she'd think to leave it:

Dantooine, because when she thinks of home, what comes to mind is the Dantooine Jedi Enclave

Dxun, for its proximity to Freedon Nadd's tomb and the Mandalorian outpost

perhaps she might have briefly considered Korriban, but the problem is both the Sith Academy and the Valley of the Sith tombs -- far too much traffic

and lastly, the place no one would think to look for Revan's holocron: Malachor V. if there's one place in the galaxy Revan actively avoids, it's Malachor. yet here is the Trayus Academy, the birthplace of the Sith Triumvirate

#headcanon #my personal headcanon is that Revan doesn't get along with Darth Traya #Arren Kae and Kreia were rivals of a sort #she was almost Sil'Rava's Master before Arren Kae petitioned to be allowed two padawan at once #and after Arren's death at Malachor V it kinda got passed on to Revan #okay to be fair my thoughts feel a bit disjointed #so my apologies if that comes across in the post

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baranedizille · 15 days

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I feel like I am haunted by Malachor V too, I come back to this game again and again.

#kotor 2 #jedi exile #visas marr #star wars knights of the old republic 2 the sith lords #my art #star wars

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imfromthemiddlekingdom · 8 months

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Felony saying that everyone in the universe can access the force if they tried hard enough makes me want to deck him in his fugly face

He’s ruining all established canon in real time. Speed running the absolute destruction of continuity of the SW universe and people are still rooting for him and his blorbo self inserts like there’s no tomorrow. Literally the whole reason I no longer engage in Ashoka content is because he massacred my girl and made her so one dimensional that my Mary Sue self insert fanfics OCs I wrote when I was 14 looks well developed compared to the absolute bland “girlboss kick ass take names” personality Ashoka has right now.

There were so many opportunities for him to explore the absolute potential of angst and conflict within Ashoka in this new series, to give her character a believable story of grief loss and growth yet he threw it all away because he wanted his OC to be the specialist girl that ever lived. This series could’ve been used to explore Ashokas conflicting feelings regarding the Anakin that taught her and was a mentor to her whilst trying to connect it to the monster that killed her family and hunted her culture into almost extinction and tried to kill her, a person he confessed to love as a sister, on Malachor. It could’ve been a good send off to a great character, to have her face that the Skyguy she put on a pedestal in her mind was in actuality the worst sort of scum and have her try to come to terms that just because she can forgive him for being the genocidal maniac he was and still hold love in her heart for who he used to be and also understand why the Jedi, her family, wasn’t the reason for their own downfall.

But alas. We got another series of “the Jedi caused their own downfall!!! Anakin did nothing wrong ever and him killing all my family and everyone I’ve ever known is so not his fault!!! It’s definitely the fault of the unbending stuck in the past council!!!”. Instead of a series that could’ve made Ashoka’s “departure” (literally never going to happen with felony at the helm, he’s going to find a way to make her immortal and then show up 200 years in the future to be the protagonist of another light v dark fight since she’s his special SI) from the series tie in nicely thematically and canonically with every other Star Wars media we have, he decided that the best way to have this series go down is 1) everyone is force sensitive if they tried hard enough ig and 2) the Jedi were bad!!! Their protocols don’t work! They were mean to my little meow meow Anakin Skywalker the greatest Jedi of all times™️ therefore he got to kill them all!!!!

Got a bit off topic but I’m still so mad that he had this chance to make Ashoka truly experience growth like the first 5 seasons of TCW yet he decided maintaining the badass rebel without a cause aesthetics for her was more important then good story telling.

Honestly though, my main problem with this series is that he decided that apparently everyone in the universe can be force sensitive if they “just tried hard enough”. Like your Midichlorian Count no longer matters since even if you were Force-Null you can still be special!!!!

This takes away any and all urgency in the Jedi Fallen Order games. It makes Cals journey absolutely redundant. It throws away all the tragedy contained in having inquisitors being force sensitive kids kidnapped from their parents and tortured till they give into the dark side. If all beings are able to use the force in his universe then there are no consequences to the inquisitors not finding the Holocron that holds the names to all force sensitive children in the universe. There would be no need to them to chase Cal and the Mantis Crew throughout the universe to obtain what they have. They could’ve just went down to any random level in Coruscant and take homeless Force-Null kids and train them.

Even better! It makes the entirety of the KOTOR games redundant!!!! Oh and I guess the hidden path is also redundant since everyone can be force sensitive and no one truly needs more saving from the empire over others :/ totally not like these kids that were saved by the path would’ve been taken and tortured into inquisitors, definitely not since EVERYONE is force sensitive nowadays or is it just the ones Ashoka trains herself because she’s the “living embodiment of the daughter uwu she’s so special and unique look how well she can train a non force sensitive to be force sensitive!!!”

Everyone in the Star Wars universe has Midichlorian’s in their blood. That is a fact. It is also an established fact that the amount each person has is different and is not determined nor dependent on lineage. Force-Nulls typically range in the 1000-3000 count and you need 7000 to be force sensitive and higher to be accepted into the order. (The order isn’t the end all be all of force cultures, Rouge One shows that Jedha’s force culture isn’t restricted to only force sensitives as the Guardian’s were never specified to be only a religious order of force sensitives. And high canon doesn’t depict many other force cultures but we know that there are many force cultures in the universe that co-exist with the Jedi with which the Jedi weren’t in opposition towards; literally not even the witches of Dathomir were oppositions anywhere outside of the battle fields.) You don’t need to be force sensitive to be part of a force culture (Jedha literally has pilgrims who come far and wide to make a pilgrimage to the holy site and not all of them were force sensitive), Sabine could’ve very easily been taught the tenets of the Jedi without retconning her to be force sensitive or making everyone in the universe force sensitive.

No where in either the EU or High Canon did anyone ever say that you have to be force sensitive to be a badass or to make a difference. Hera did not hold the title of the best pilot in the universe just for some rat of a man to come and say that Anakin was the best because *muh force sensitivity!!!!* Some of the most heroic and most influential (good or bad) people in the franchise are Force-Null! And that’s great! It means that the force doesn’t make anyone better than anyone else! It’s a quirk of the universe! To retcon that everyone can and is force sensitive if they tried hard enough is literally cheapening everything the franchise stands for. Andor did not literally give us an entire story about how Force-Nulls in the Galaxy makes just as much of a difference as force sensitives for felony to come out and say that “you know what??? Midichlorian’s are a scam! You get a force sensitivity! You get a force sensitivity! Everyone gets a force sensitivity!!!!”

Sabine was great as she was in rebels, why cheapen it with “oh she’s actually force sensitive all this time!!!” When we could’ve stuck with badass Force-Null Mandalorian can kick your ass five ways to Sunday with her paint bombs and blasters you force wielding asshole!!! Like why even do that felony. Do you want people to hate her??? Nvm ofc you do, you need Ashoka to be the best in every way possible even if it means ruining every other beloved character in this franchise👍

#Star Wars salt #star wars #ashoka series #Ashoka Tano critical #anti anakin skywalker #anti Dave Filoni #fuck you felony I want to punch you in your rat face #Ashoka series critical #the Midichlorian count should mean something felony!!!!!#why are you making Ashoka a Mary sue😭 literally give her a personality that isn’t kickass take names please I beg #sw salt #I hate it here #jedi positive

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attonposting · 1 year

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Something I don't see many people invoke when writing Atton, and I wish more would, is the fact that his exiled Jedi crush is the General who pulled the trigger on the Mass Shadow Generator. That is a big deal! Him blowing up at the Exile over Malachor is nearly lost in the rapidfire shitstorm that's his whole confession, but Atton's on par with Mira for having personal beef over Malachor V. His headspace beneath the pazaak routine must have been a confused and angry mess once he learned that this ex-Jedi he was carting around was General Meetra Surik, or whichever name you gave your Exile.

Like, Atton was coming to grips with the fact that the Exile used to be a Jedi. They seem decent enough... clueless, and too much of a bleeding heart for their own good, they're the type of idiot who paints a target on their back every time they get out of bed, but at least they were a veteran instead of one of those worthless trust-in-the-Force types and they're not afraid to get their hands dirty when there's people that need to be shot. And hell, if the Jedi kicked them out, that's a point in their favor – maybe even enough for him to worry for them late at night after the juma's really kicked in, because sometimes they just seem so goddamn worn-down and look, he's not totally heartless. Anyone with eyes can see that they're lugging around some heavy shit; of course he's gonna wonder. And then he gets smacked with that.

Malachor V was huge to Atton. It's that theme of all of the crew's stories coming back to that single moment in time. Now, it's important to establish that Malachor is not a single event that broke Atton. He was already in bad straits by the end of the Mandalorian Wars, and heavily disillusioned by all he'd witnessed and done during them. It's not the end-all-be-all of his fall to the Dark Side and it may well have happened anyway. But Malachor was the capstone – a single terrible event that shattered the remainder of his faith. Atton was present during that battle (“You weren't there. You have no idea what happened.” -> “Oh yeah? Shows how much you know. Maybe you're wrong about a lot of other things, too.”) and alludes to trauma over it (“Wish I'd died there, that the storms had dragged me down into Malachor V”). My take is that he was among the forces arrayed for the space battle and barely managed to fly his way out of the gravity well, but you can interpret many different experiences from the loose constraints of canon.

No matter how you slice his involvement, though, Atton felt utterly betrayed by Malachor V. He'd already felt that the Republic was mismanaging its troops, that guys like him were being served up as cannon fodder while useless senators waffled over the measures they desperately needed on the ground and the Jedi sat on their Council thrones offering platitudes of protection while failing to lift a finger in anyone's defense. But here was the absolute worst of it – command straight-up lied to him, him and everyone else in that stars-damned clusterfuck, and sent them out as sacrificial lambs. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers laid out as bait for a goddamn trap. Didn't even get a chance to fucking fight, just a tongue-in-cheek “thank you for your sacrifice”, because if they'd signed up to fight then he guesses that meant they were already dead on paper anyway.

I think it's likely that the way Malachor ends up attributed to Revan was revisionism that happened later, in the same way that Revan accumulated blame for the actions of Malak in the Jedi Civil War. Revan definitely had a lot of blame for what happened at Malachor, but Atton would have hated whoever made that call. Whether he chalked it up to Meetra Surik or Insert Better Exile Name Here or just the Republic in general, he was a furious, bitter mess... and I don't think he would have been so quick to follow Revan if he'd known just how much of a hand they had in Malachor's planning.

Fast forward a decade later, when he meets the person behind that call, the Jedi behind that call, and they're nothing like he would have expected.

And he knows this because he's already seen them in action, gotten to know them a little – likes them, even, and isn't that a damned thing he tries to avoid. Unless your Exile is unusually chatty, Atton probably learns this sometime on Telos; possibly from Lt. Grenn when they get arrested (specifically the fact that the Republic wants to meet with them, that'll set off some alarm bells, and possibly bring in the Exile's full/real name), possibly when they meet Bao-Dur and his habit of using military ranks, possibly from the Handmaiden Sisters when they end up in Atris's Academy, and definitely from the holorecording of the Exile's trial if he hasn't already clued in. If he'd known who they were on Peragus, Atton might've used them to get off the station and planted a vibro in their back as soon as he didn't need them anymore, but now he's seen the kind of person they are – the parts that are just like him, the parts that are better than him – and he doesn't know how to feel.

I like to think that while Atton comes to terms with it, and probably a lot quicker than he was expecting... he doesn't forgive the Exile for Malachor. And it's the same as how forgiving Atton for his crimes is missing the point, and not what he wants anyway. It's more about moving on. The war is always going to be there, but it doesn't matter anymore, because they're not the same people who made those calls. What's important is that he understands. And in the end, not forgiving them might even be comfortable for Atton. He feels closer to them – both on a personal level and an aspirational one – in that they've both committed truly terrible crimes, things that cannot ever be made okay, and the Exile still managed to pick themselves up and keep trying. He's got mixed feelings about the charity act, but the fact that they were able to stop running and face the music for what they did is what captivates him, because that's something he never had the grit to do.

#atton rand #the jedi exile #malachor #kotor ii #kotor 2

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