I’m just imaging an AU where Padme’s pregnancy didn’t have to be a secret and Anakin is trying to pick out names for the baby so he asks his men for ideas, and the clones, of course, throw out names like
“Zapper!”
“Sling!”
“Bomber!”
“Kickback!”
Anakin is internally screaming, but he doesn’t want to insult them by saying those are terrible names so he’s just like, “…thanks, guys.”
even better is if after the kids are born, there are still clones around for security and such and when they’re old enough to talk they know they were given names by their parents, but clones see those names as like. your technical/official ID. not as your actual personal name. so they talk to these little kids who of course love preposterous names and that’s how leia is also named POWERFIST
I’ve reblogged this before but imagine Luke being dubbed “Cinnamon Roll” by the clones
Powerfist and Cinnamon Roll Skywalker. Deal.
OH MY GOD so i was just gonna tagspiral about this but I have Too Many Thoughts so i’m gonna actually write real text for once
So: here we have Powerfist Leia Skywalker and Cinnamon Roll Luke Skywalker. They probably spend a lot of time with the clones, right? Because if Padme and Anakin aren’t in a Secret Relationship then Anakin probably doesn’t fall, so the war doesn’t end the way it does in canon - actually, shit, I forgot about 66. So let’s say Palps tries to recruit Anakin anyway because he’s super-powerful and Palps wants that on his side, but Anakin betrays him to the Council and Order 66 doesn’t happen.
But just because Palpatine tripped and fell into about a dozen lightsabers on his way to his jail cell doesn’t mean the war’s over. The Separatists are fucked, they can’t exactly claim that Sidious made them do it, so they’re going to try their hardest not to lose. So Anakin’s still spending a lot of time out in the field, and Padme’s still got Senate stuff to do. And they probably both already had serious business security details, since somebody needs to be around whenever Anakin decides to do something really fucking stupid without backup (he usually manages without backup, but Obi-Wan, Padme and every clone friend of Anakin’s agree that they’d rather have someone on him anyway), and Padme’s a significant target for the Separatists because a) she’s pretty well-connected in the Senate and b) Palps was hoping he could kill her off to get Anakin to fall. Which would’ve ended pretty badly for him but Palpatine clearly doesn’t understand love so he wouldn’t have realised that.
SO. Anakin gets called off to spearhead some campaign somewhere, Padme has to go to the Senate, and who’s left to look after Powerfist and Cinnamon Roll? (Padme finds these names hilarious.) It’s the clones.
“Okay,” Rex says, no longer quite so angry about being grounded while his blaster wound heals. “Watch carefully. This is how you hold a blaster, okay?”
Luke and Leia are fascinated.
Padme, who entered politics at a frankly ridiculous age and was embroiled in her first war at the age of fourteen, isn’t all that upset when she finds out. Okay, she’d prefer it if the weaponry lessons waited until the kids were older, but considering who their parents are, they’re pretty tempting kidnap targets so she’d rather they knew how to look after themselves. And they’re so cute doing their unarmed combat lessons!
Anakin - Anakin is very protective of his tiny children. HE’S SEEN SOME SHITTY STUFF IN THE GALAXY, OKAY, HE JUST WANTS TO WRAP THEM IN COTTON WOOL AND HIDE THEM SOMEWHERE UNTIL THEY’RE EIGHTEEN. He is not impressed when he finds out. Every stupid, dangerous thing he ever did as a child is running through his head on a loop. He did so many stupid things.
“Not that many,” Padme says, patting his shoulder.
“Pod races,” Anakin says hoarsely. “Blowing up Trade Federation droid ships. Racing speeders. Sticking my hands into droid innards.”
“That isn’t that dangerous,” Padme says, frowning.
“What if I’d electrocuted myself?” Anakin demands. “I could have died so many ways, Padme, why did I pass this on to my children, oh god.”
Padme looks over at Rex for support.
“He’s never told you any of the really wild war stories, has he,” Rex says, deadpan. “They’re too short to fly fighters, but we can start them on acrobatics soon, they’ll have an easier time if they’ve already had practice not throwing up the first time one of them decides to spin the ship they’re flying.”
“I’ll take that into consideration,” Padme says, wondering what Anakin’s stories are if they aren’t the wild ones.
Somewhere, Obi-Wan Kenobi just broke a rib laughing.
It’s canon (or was) that as a child Leia had a fluorescent pink alien kitten-type animal named All-Terrain Attack Vehicle, so I can see her being totally on board with the awesome names.
Now consider: regular OT universe, lots of the clones went AWOL after Order 66 and many of them found their way into the Rebellion. The Rebellion was thus influenced by their culture, including this habit of giving out names like this.
Clones around Leia Organa when she’s growing up.
Clones teaching her to shoot, to fight, to fall, to fly. One of them finds her crying over some momentary childhood upsetness at age five and cheers her up by teaching her to hold a blaster. And then to shoot it. And then to hit what she’s aiming at.
At six, she gets into her first fistfight with another child, a spoiled brat of Alderaan’s nobility, and comes out of it with a bloody nose and a couple broken knickles because she doesn’t know how to punch correctly. Bail gives her a scathing lecture on deportment and courtesy and keeping her temper and how a princess must behave, given edge with his own terror that she’s taking after her other father. The clone who finds her, sulking in the mechanics bay, stung and furious, teaches her how to fight.
At eight, she wants to learn to fly, and Bail, visions of Anakin dancing in his head, dissuades her. It’s the most natural thing in the world to go to the clones and ask to be taught.
At ten she announces that she doesn’t want to go into politics, she wants to be a clone. When her mother points out, gently, that she is the Crown Princess and has responsibilities, she suggests they find girls who look like her to be the Princess for her when she’s busy. She has no idea why both her parents go white at the suggestion.
At eleven, fresh out of another fight–she wants to go help the Rebellion directly, she wants to fight, she wants to go places, be out in the thick of things, and her parents want her to study and do princess things, they want to keep her safe–she goes to the clones with several years of pent-up questions.
The clones are ones who spent years fighting beside Anakin Skywalker, and almost as much time spent running interference for, and pretending not to know about, Anakin’s secret relationship with Padmé Amidala. They didn’t know she was pregnant, but between the piloting skills and the temper and the recklessness and the elder Organas’ reaction to her decoy idea, they can guess.
One of them brings out a medkit and they run a genetic test on a drop of Leia’s blood. They’ve seen the readout of Anakin’s displayed so many times they’ve practically committed it to memory, and the relationship is obvious even to those not medic-trained. Now Leia has a second set of parents, and a host of stories about them, and the personal loyalty of every clone trooper in the Rebellion–General Skywalker’s daughter.
When she’s twelve, a thought occurs to her, and it’s the clones, not her parents, that she asks, “if my father was a Jedi, am I Force-sensitive too?”
Some clone out working support for the Rebellion’s secret operatives gets in touch with Fulcrum for her.
A couple days after Leia’s thirteenth birthday, Ahsoka Tano makes planetfall on Alderaan and is snuck by the clones (”Good to see you, Commander,”) into the mechanics bay to meet Leia. By the time Bail and Breha figure out what Leia’s disappearing for this time, Leia’s already made her first lightsaber and is working on her second.
When Darth Vader tracks down Ahsoka Tano, Ahsoka Tano is not alone.
“Who are you?” he asks, confused by the presence of this fierce child–his grand-apprentice, as it were, glaring at him from behind two lightsabers (blue, for her father, and green, for her teacher) like he’d offended her grievously in the past. (He’s never really met Princess Leia Organa, beyond an occasional presence at the same Imperial event, but she knows quite a lot about him. She isn’t going to run for Senate, but she is going to rebel. She does her research.)
“Killshot,” is what she says.
Darth Vader was Anakin Skywalker, and Anakin Skywalker knows clone naming customs when he hears them. “A Force-sensitive clone?” is what he asks. (The name was gifted to her at nine, when she beat the combat flight simulator on its highest mode eleven times in a row.)
Leia beams. It’s the best compliment anyone could give her. “Yes,” she says, and brings up her blades.
Anonymous asked: you're really freaking cute when you're happy/enthused about things!
YOU’RE REALLY FREAKING CUTE ALWAYS ANON, WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT THAT, CHECKMATE.
Sorry, I got nervous.
[video]
Anonymous asked: So how was Rogue One?
MY G O D IT WAS A BLESSING AND A GIFT UNTO US ALL.
In all seriousness, though, I loved it. It couldn’t have been better designed for me if they tried. Brutal honesty about Doing What Needs To Be Done, desperate people fighting desperate wars, shouting matches between allies with laser-targeted accusations and grief-driven sharp tongues, bloody hands and buried sins.
Basically, look, okay, here: if you read and liked the entire Animorphs series, this will be your jam. If you prefer your heroes to be unsullied and clean (which, no judgement), maybe not. But seriously, give it a try.
A couple other things:
“Fiercely competent anti-fascist space Latinx with a robot best friend” is my new favorite weirdly specific trope, see also: Poe Dameron
Jyn Erso grows so much over the movie she’s my daughter and I love her
I want to wrap Bodhi Rook in blankets and put him down in front of Fantasia and cuddle him and feed him chocolate until he’s Happy, I’m a simple woman with simple needs
Darth Vader is so hilariously Extra
Krennic’s cape is a fucking tragedy
“Welcome home” *bawls*
Baze and Chirrut are married and have been for like thirty years, sorry I don’t make the rules
[video]
Anonymous asked: Thank you thank you thank you for the E/R fluff! I'm grinning like an idiot.
I really want a science fiction story where aliens come to invade earth and effortlessly wipe out humanity, only to be fought off by the wildlife.
They were expecting military resistance. They weren’t counting on bears.
Imagine coming to a hostile alien world and being attacked by a horde of creatures that can weigh up to 3 tons, run at 30 km/h (19 mph), and bite with a force of 8,100 newtons (1,800 lbf).
By the time you realise that they can traverse water, it’s too late. The surviving members of your unit manage to make it back by shedding their excess gear and running for their lives; the slower ones were crushed to death within minutes.
You later describe the creature to one of the humans you captured, wanting to know the name of the monstrosity that will haunt your nightmares for cycles to come.
The human smiles as it speaks a single word, slowly and distinctly, in its barbaric tongue.
“Hippopotamus.”
This is giving me the biggest, creepiest grin I might have ever grinned
Imagine being the next crew to go down to earth and thinking “it’s fine, we got this. We have the weapons and equipment necessary to deal with bears and *shudders* hippopotamuses. We’ll be fine.”
And at first you are, you’ve learned how to dodge. You’ve learned where their territories are. You know how to defend yourself.
But then one night you are sleeping in your shelter. You’re in a tree covered temperate part of earth. It seems benign. There are been no sightings of the dreaded “hippos” around. Not even any bears. But there is a slight rustle of the undergrowth. You try and ignore it telling yourself it is just the wind.
Then you hear the rustle again. closer this time.
You peer out into the darkness but see nothing amongst the trees.
The rustle again and now you realise you can smell something. It’s musky and slightly foul. It’s the smell of an omen, a warning. But what of? Where is this smell coming from.
You sit up, but it’s too late. The foul smelling creature is on you. You are hit with 17kg of coarse fur and vicious bites. Long dark claws tear in to you and you are pinned down white the striped creature tries to bite your throat.
It takes some doing but you manage to wrestle free. Blood drips from your wounds and already they itch with the sign of infection. The creature has a bloodied snout, rust rad, mingling with the black and white hairs. It lets out a terrifying growl from the back of its throat and looks to attack again. It’s between you and your knife, so your only choice is to back away.
Eventually the creature gives up and snuffles off in to the undergrowth, down a hole near your shelter you hadn’t noticed before.
When you make it back to your base you once again consult the captive human.
“Badger.” they say, with a solemn nod.
One word: Moose
“Our vehicles are far superior to the local human models, in range, speed, armament, and any other metric you care to name! Nothing could possibly-”
BAMrumblerumblethumpcrash!!!
“That’s called a moose.”
“We should be free of the threat of the ‘moose’ here on our new floating accommodation”
*humans start sniggering*
“… they can swim, can’t they”
*humans start laughing louder*
….
*mid-winter*
‘I DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED! K’T'SURKIK WENT OUTSIDE AND A MOUND OF SNOW ROSE UP AND ATE HIM’
“What is this ‘wolverine’ you speak of?”
Tell me the story of the unpleasantly surprised alien invaders and their captive human remnant, getting more smug the more the aliens fail at basic scouting…
I know we’re all talking the big smash-‘em-up type animals, but what about the little ones? Are aliens prepared for spiders? Mosquitoes? Fleas? Ticks? Even humans get sick or die from some of those, who knows what the fuck they’d do to an unprepared alien.
Nobody expects the mosquitoes
Radio: “We seem to have located a colony-based life form. Primary scans seem to indicate that their dwelling consists mainly of wax and a calorically high substance suitable for our consumption. Since food reserves are minimal due the nature of this mission, we’ve elected to attempt harvest. Requesting that alpha base interrogate the captives as to the nature of this find.”
Aliens: “The captives seem to recognize the life form as… What was it, again?”
Human: “Bees! :-)”
Alien: *With somewhat resolved tone* “…Bees.”
Radio: *Nothing but screaming and the word: “BEES!!!”*
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSS
War of the Worlds 2: The Eukaryotes Awaken
What sort of barbaric planet is this??
Unit: “We seem to have stumbled into a ‘desert’ area, but it also seems that there is vegetation in small patches. Advise.”
Alien: “Well, human?”
Human: “…Savannah, I think.”
Alien: “A ‘Savannah’, according to the human. Is there anything else?”
Unit: “There appears to be another feral creature, similar to the ‘house cat’. It is watching from afar. Our scan indicates that it is most likely male.”
Human: “Is it a cheetah? I think it’s a cheetah.”
Alien: “It is called a ‘cheetah’. Proceed with caution.”
Unit: “Wait, it’s moving towards us - it’s much faster than we thoUAAGH-” The radio then cuts out, shortly followed by faint screams denoting many more cheetahs attacking the unit in sudden and quick succession.
I keep reblogging this, and every installment is better than the last
Alfie had planned on spending his life aiding in marine animal conservation. A quiet life. When the aliens invaded America, well… he did nothing, because he was just an ordinary Irish citizen. When they came to Europe, well… It wasn’t ideal, but mostly they let the humans carry on with whatever they were doing that they didn’t understand. Marine zoology research was one of those things. Alfie stayed in his lab and kept working. For a few months.
Until a man in a long brown coat and black glasses somehow made his way to Alfie’s work station.
“Our information tells us your locating beacons are still online.”
That was a rather cold greeting, but whatever.
“Sure they are” said Alfie.
“I work for … a certain organization … we have intrests in your work.”
subtle, Alfie thought.
“The Aliens are setting out for Iceland in a few days. We have a…collegue… acting as a guide on board.”
“So?”
The strange man grinned
“I need access to the real-time coordiates of every orca pod in the northern Atlantic”
Alfie picked up a small device from his desk and threw it at the surprised man.
“Been making this in the last months, since, y’know, no government grants to tell me what I should be doing. You have access to data for orcas, whales, even some polar bears. Sea lions. That sort of stuff. Have fun.”
The look on the Resistance man’s face was well worth the effort he’d put into that device.
