Rise Up, Oh Heart, For There is Another Battle to Win

(2/2) Some guy gets a tattoo of a random array and tells people its what the Flame Alchemist uses to make fire when it actually makes dirt take the shape of a square or something. Anyone who actually knows anything about alchemy brings their own array for the tattoo artist to use as reference.

EXCELLENT IM SCREAMING

Even better when some of these nonsense formations get super popular and everyone’s buying gear with it. (Which the alchemists don’t stop because people walking around with bullshit alchemic arrays are really no harm)

Except one day when Mustang’s walking through the streets of Central, some teen decked out in nonsense alchemy tattoos stops him like

Kid: “Cool Flame Alchemist costume, but your flame salamander is on the wrong side.”
Mustang: *pointing aggressively to his glove* “The flame salamander is not on the wrong side!”

                      …two truths and a lie.

one. If you cut Poe Dameron open (and they have, a few times, because shrapnel is a kung-fucker, and he’s gotten sort of attached to not having alusteel in his bloodstream) you’d find the Republic there, scored into the underside of his ribs. Mama used to say that nursed them together, Poe and his little sister, Revuelta, born screaming in the cockpit of her x-wing.

but I’m your favorite! Poe had always giggled, finishing the story for her, and mama always had said, never doubt it, ishoco, because that was simpler than, it was easier to bring you into the world. there was less blood.

(every child’s origins are the stuff of mythology, at least in the way you tell it—Ben Organa came too early, in the midst a magnetic storm that almost tore the Falcon to pieces; Rey breathed her first during starfall, on a planet whose name no one could quite remember. The boy who would one day be called Finn, meaning fair, slept in the circle of his mother’s arms that first night, because she never wanted to let him leave her skin.

Poe Dameron was born screaming into the cockpit of his mother’s x-wing, cradling alzamiento between his heart and his breastbone.)

two. Everyone gets it wrong, they say it must have been when and talk about control sticks and x-wings, punching through to the blue-white of hyperspace. Maybe for everyone else, it was. But to him, flying didn’t even register as something else, different than breathing, or internal organs, something that could be articulated in the subjunctive. Sitting in a cockpit is like tasting the inside of his mouth, there’s nothing there but more of him, more himness.

He couldn’t have fallen in love with a thing indistinguishable from the shape of his skin.

No, the first time Poe fell in love, it was with a hastily holo-copied piece of flimsi, handed out among T-14 class. Through the transparisteel was a bright, clear afternoon, so he caught only fragments of what his teacher was saying, perished with Alderaan, and best known poet of the civil war—

It’s chance that his eyes land on the single line of hand-scrawled poetry:when the multitudes run rioting against you and against everything unjust and inhuman, I will be in their midst with the torch in my hand

(Under his breastbone, Revuelta stirs. Poe falls in love—not with poetry but with the image, himself, all skinny adolescent elbows, standing against the unjust and holding the torch.)

After his mother’s funeral, he goes on a nerve burner of a bender, and wakes up three days later at the foot of the Force-tree. (It hasn’t flowered since the attack on the new Jedi temple, but Poe fights the strange urge to apologize.) His side aches sharply, and he cringes, stumbling inside to the refresher. 

He lifts his shirt to see ‘with the torch in my hand’, tattooed along the slant of his ribs.

three. He hasn’t slept more than four standard units for a week when the General finds him under his x-wing. BB-8 (that traitor) doesn’t warn him, and so suddenly she’s there, passing him the sonic wrench he had been vainly reaching for.

She’s shorter than he is, Poe realizes with a start. Standing in the command center, surrounded by people who need orders and answers, she’s always seemed to eat up space, towering above them—here she’s just a woman. He can see the places where the eumelanin regeneration has left her scalp blotchy.

general, he says.

you know my brother blew up the Death Star, the General replies idly, and it takes Poe a minute to remember that Luke Skywalker, Star-killer, is actually the same man as General Organa’s brother. (Poe mostly remembers the latter skipping stones across a pond with the Force, talking to a tree in Poe’s yard as though he expected it to answer back.)

he asked to be moved to planetside combat, after that, she adds after a moment.

Poe blinks. I didn’t know that, ma’am.

Luke said he had heard them, crying out, all the voices of the Death Star as they perished. he couldn’t do it again, he said—he said ’at least with a blaster, you can only kill one at a time.’

Poe stares. His fingers are numb around the sonic wrench.

war is ugly, lieutenant, the General says. There’s something carved-out about how she says it, like she’s had this conversation too many times before. anyone who tells you different is lying, or trying to recruit you. but you did good work on Eraski; it was necessary and you did it well, you did it cleanly. I wish that weren’t such a cold comfort.

I—is it worth it? he asks the General. He wants to ask Princess Leia Organa, whose planet was swallowed up by black and fire, everything she loved with it, but it’s not his place. Only mama had ever called her leia, with the artificial lung to prove she had earned the right.

(the kriffing bey legacy, Poe’s father had snarled, when Poe told him he was defecting to the Resistance. always happy to bleed for leia organa.)

For a long moment, the General is silent. When she reaches up and touches Poe’s face, he flinches—but she just traces his cheek with her fingertips before dropping her hand. go to bed, dameron, she says, very quietly. your mother would have killed me if she knew I’ve turned you into such a lich.

yes, ma’am, Poe says.

She’s very tall, walking away.

Okay, well obviously Anakin is the slave boy / man in black / Dread Sith Lord Vader. (But not the real Lord Vader. Anakin took the title from the man who supposedly killed him, but who in fact took him on as an apprentice; his name was really Dooku. He himself had inherited the title from the previous Lord Vader, who was not the real Lord Vader either. His name was Sifo-Dyas. The real Lord Vader had been retired thirty years and living like a king on Nar Shaddaa. It was the name, Dooku explained, that was important for inspiring the necessary fear. No one would surrender to the Dread Sith Lord Ani.)

Padmé is the simple peasant girl Palpatine picked to be Queen of Naboo. Originally, he planned to have her murdered on her coronation and the Trade Federation blamed for it, thus sparking the war that would bring him to power. But when that fails, he has to regroup and finally decides it’s going to be so much more moving when he has her killed not as an innocent victim but as a martyr.

Nute Gunray has been secretly hired by Palpatine to murder Padmé and start a war (a prestigious line of work, with a long and glorious tradition). He in turn has hired two mercenaries to help him with the task: the former Jedi padawan turned drunken soldier of fortune Obi-Wan Kenobi, and the prospector and prize fighter Dexter Jettster.*

Obi-Wan saw his Jedi master murdered by a mysterious tattooed Sith Lord when he was still a padawan. Now, Obi-Wan loved his master, and so naturally he challenged his murderer to a duel. He failed, but the Sith let him live, and now he has dedicated his life to revenge…and left the Jedi Order to seek it. He’s been searching for the tattooed Sith ever since.

Dex is honestly in this gig for the money, but he’s forever annoying Nute with his horrible dad jokes and puns, and in spite of himself he’s basically adopted Obi-Wan. The guy clearly needs someone to look after him.

Maul is the tattooed Sith Obi-Wan is searching for. He’s been working as Palpatine’s lieutenant all this time. His assistant Ventress keeps his Pit of Despair running smoothly.

Barriss is the Jedi healer who used to work for the Republic, until the Republic’s stinking Chancellor fired her (and all the other Jedi), and thank you so much for bringing up such a painful subject.

Ahsoka is not a witch, she’s her wife, but after what Barriss just said, she’s not even sure she wants to be that anymore.

Yoda is a very impressive clergyman indeed. Because of reasons.

*

A few choice scenes:

Anakin learning fencing and the Force and anything else people will teach him while playing aide to Dooku’s Dread Sith Lord Vader.

“Good night, Anakin. Sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.”

*

Obi-Wan helping Anakin scale a cliff so that they can have a proper duel. “I see you’re a Sith Lord,” he says. “You don’t by any chance have tattoos on your face?”

“Do you always begin conversations this way?”

Obi-Wan tells his story, after which Anakin graciously removes his mask to show that his face is tattoo-free. And then they fight. It’s all very cordial.

*

“Why are you wearing a mask?” Dex asks. “Were you burned by lava or something?”

“Oh no, it’s just they’re terribly comfortable. I think everyone will be wearing them in the future.”

*

Anakin and Nute Gunray have a battle of wits.

“But Sarlaac venom is from Tatooine, and Tatooine, as everyone knows, is entirely peopled with criminals, who are used to not being trusted as you are not trusted by me, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you.”

*

Padmé and Anakin escape to Tatooine (it’s definitely Tatooine), where they attempt to hide out from Palpatine.

“What are the three dangers of Tatooine? One, the lightning sand. No problem. Two, the sarlaac pits. There’s a growling sound that precedes those, so we can avoid them easily…”

“Anakin, what about the WROUSes?”

“Womp rats of unusual size? I don’t think they exist.”

A fight with several womp rats immediately follows.

*

Padmé makes a bargain with Palpatine to save Anakin’s life. At this point she hasn’t realized quite how awful Palpatine is, but even so, she’s already planning how she’s going to get out of this.

Unfortunately, Palpatine wastes no time at all, and Anakin is turned over to Maul to be tortured. There’s dismemberment involved. When Obi-Wan and Dex find him, he’s a mangled, limbless husk, and very definitely dead.

*

Or…maybe only mostly dead.

Obi-Wan tries several stories to convince Barriss to help. She finds each of these stories increasingly ludicrous.

“He’s the Chosen One, destined to bring balance to the Force!”

Barriss just stares at him. “Boy are you a rotten liar,” she says.

“I need him to help avenge my master, murdered these twenty years!”

Barriss is even less impressed by this, but she takes a look, and unfortunately for her, Ahsoka won’t give her any peace until she’s brought Anakin back. It takes a lot of doing. Not so much miracle pills as the miracle of modern cybernetics, but hey, it amounts to the same thing in the end.

Besides, Obi-Wan’s promised that if Barriss saves Anakin, Palpatine suffers humiliations galore, and that is definitely a noble cause.

*

Meanwhile Padmé has a crisis of conscience and goes barging into Palpatine’s office one night.

“It comes to this: I love democracy. I always have. If you tell me I must be your puppet Queen, please believe I will be leading a revolution by morning.”

*

Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Dex break into the Naboo palace by means of a cunning plan involving a hover sled, Ventress’ lightsabers, and a fog machine they found in Maul’s torture pit. (Look, Maul is absolutely the dramatic type who owns a fog machine. Don’t blame me. That’s just science.)

Rescuing Padmé proves to be the most difficult part of the whole plan, mainly because Padmé has already rescued herself, and finding her is a bit difficult. And then Obi-Wan catches sight of Maul the tattooed Sith, and he’s off on his quest for vengeance.

Meanwhile Anakin still can’t walk that well on his new legs and ends up having to bluff his way through a fight with Palpatine.** Or at least, to keep Palpatine occupied just long enough for Padmé to take him down with a stun blast.

(Anakin really wanted to kill him, but Padmé insists Palpatine has to stand trial. Anakin isn’t convinced; at least, not until she points out that Palpatine living a long life alone in prison with his failures would make a much more satisfying revenge.)

*

“Hello. My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi. You killed my master. Prepare to die.”

*

And of course, for maximum irony, this story ends with Obi-Wan becoming the new Dread Sith Lord Vader.

——————————-

* Okay, okay. I realize Dex as Fezzik is a stretch. But everyone else fits so perfectly and there’s really no one in the PT era who fits for Fezzik. I considered Chewie, but he doesn’t have a connection with Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan apparently has no friends outside of Anakin and Dex. :( So.

** So I wanted to make a joke about “to the pain,” only I realized that what happens to Anakin in canon basically is “to the pain,” which…kinda destroys the humor tbh.

Basically, I imagine those same two stormtroopers who walked by the interrogation room when Kylo was destroying everything to go and patrol down on the maintenance level- things are kicking off, it’s quiet down there, they can just wait until this whole Resistance thing blows over. And then they’re walking past this panel and it’s punched out from the inside by Captain Phasma, covered in space garbage and clutching a dianoga’s dripping eyestalk in her fist.

“The trash compactor requires maintenance.” Phasma says coolly, to the trooper who hasn’t soiled himself. “Alert the janitorial detail.”