Finn yelps. It’s a very masculine yelp, obviously, but – Rey has this habit, lately. Of popping up where he least expects it.
“Tell who what?” he asks, when his heart rate comes down.
Rey widens her eyes at him, and jerks her head at Poe. “You were staring. Again.”
“What? No I wasn’t.” He forces a laugh. Poe got a new jacket. It fits him good. Really– “You’re staring.”
“I’m not staring.”
“Just tell him already. You’re driving me insane!” She flicks his nose gently; he bats at her hand. “It’s not doing wonders for your brain, either.”
It occurs to Finn that she thinks he has feelings for Poe.
It occurs to Finn that she’s not exactly wrong. He scowls down at her. “Didn’t you grow up on a desert planet in the middle of nowhere?”
She gives him a toothy grin. “Didn’t you grow up in a place where literally everyone dressed the same?”
“I don’t see how that makes you any more qualified.”
“Qualified to do what?” A heavy arm drapes around his shoulders, reeling him in. Another hand lifts towards Rey, and performs some strange sort of pilot handshake that he isn’t allowed to know. Rey’s whole face lights up as she and Poe (and it’s Poe, of course it’s Poe, the world doesn’t love Finn enough for it to not be Poe) make explosion sounds out of the corners of their mouths.
It’s so cute, he’s pretty sure he’s going to die. Straight up expire.
“Uh.” He looks to Rey for help, but her gaze has conveniently slid away to some other location. “Stuff?”
Poe raises his eyebrows at her. “You having trouble dealing with the stuff, Rey?”
“Actually, I’m finding the stuff fairly all right. Finn might be having a little trouble, though.”
“I’m fine with the stuff!” he says loudly. Poe’s arm still hasn’t moved. Rey’s face still looks like it could set the world afire with joy. Finn is in monumental amounts of trouble.
“Then I suppose I should leave you to it,” Rey says, nudging him. And before he can say anything at all, she’s off across the base, weaving through people with an almost preternatural sort of grace.
Both Poe and Finn just watch her for a moment. And then it passes, and the pilot is gripping him by the shoulders, looking Very Seriously into his eyes. “Listen,” he says, also Very Seriously. “I think you should tell her.”
Finn groans. Very Loudly.
It’s much later when he manages to extricate himself from that particular conversation, and he’s pretty sure all the blood in his body has lurched to his head. He just about knocks over General Organa of all people, because that’s the sort of day he’s having.
She squints at him, and he has the disquieting impression that she’s reading his mind.
….She’s not, right?
“Tell ‘em both at the same time,” she advises. “We could use the entertainment around here.”
The fact that he doesn’t die on the spot is, Finn feels, a testament to his strength and perseverance.
what TLJ probably meant: poor Kylo Ren look he had a reason to come into the Dark Side his own uncle tried to kill him :’((( it’s also all Luke’s fault, blame him, he gave up on Ben so easy!!
what I, an intellectual, learned form TLJ: if Luke “there is still good in you dad Vader” Skywalker takes one look at Ben Solo’s mind and thinks this one is irredeemable then well, shit, I absolutely believe him
Kylo: luke tried to kill me when I was just a child!
What Rey Should have Said: And if he had then you wouldn’t have DESTROYED MULTIPLE PLANETS
Kylo: …..
Rey: YOU SLAUGHTERED BILLIONS
Kylo: …….
Rey: YOU MURDERED CHILDREN WITH A LASER SWORD
Kylo: okay but Luke…tried to kill me…
Rey: Because he saw your future where you murdered children and blew up planets
Kylo: Okay but if I WAS DEAD that would be BAD for me personally
Rey: But good for the billions of innocent people who you brutally murdered
Kylo: But…bad…for me…
So
TRAGIC
Rey: I don’t think you understand how this “Sad Backstory” thing works
Not just that, but literally IMMEDIATELY after almost getting killed by Luke he goes and kills all of the other jedi-in-training who won’t follow him. His first action after almost being killed, because Luke thought he was going to be evil, was murdering people.
I still can’t find the logical connection here like why would that be your second step
So a couple things about Coruscant, circa roughly right before Order 66 and probably during the whole Empire too but I like the Prequel era as a backdrop so bear with me:
Most of Coruscant’s population technically lives in the sam building as the rich and powerful but MUCH lower down and the levels aren’t necessarily easily acessible.
Padme mentions in an episode of TCW that power rationing in the lower levels had gotten to the point where her senatorial aides only had power and running water once a week.
Coruscant’s police department is underfunded and too small for the sheer masses it’s supposed to patrol, so a lot of “crime” occurs in the form of “Normal business transactions but we ain’t paying taxes for services we’ll never see”
It gets more dangerous the farther down you go not necessarily because of crime but because the lower levels are full of things like Giant Mutant Rats, Escaped Monsters From The Pet Trade, and Monstrous Eyeless Humanoids That Might Have Been Normal People Several Centuries Ago Until They Stopped Being Able To See The Sun And Also Might Like To Eat Toes
But between food shortages, a lack of regulation and Lots of large Animals Down There, you can’t tell me there aren’t people who are effectively
Ecumenopolis Bush-Meat Hunters. Owing to the lack of actual Bush and the Rule Of Cool, we’ll call them Dark Meat Hunters.
Anyone willing to brave The Deep Dark and come back with fresh* meat for thier hungry communities and maybe also some cool tusks the size of your whole leg is probably a very respected member of thier community**, and with the proliferation of military-grade weapons in Star Wars it’s probably not that difficult to get your hands on the appropriate gear*** So there’s probably an entire collective of Dark Meat Hunters. Some of them might have even made firends with the Eyeless Humanoids**** and formed cooperative You-Return-Any-Lost-Eyed-People-You-Find-And-I’ll-Smuggle-Some-Vaccines-Down relationships with them.
*Well, it was killed today and is free of any visible parasites at least. You should porbably have your steak well-done though. As a precaution.
**Not Canon, but heavily suggested by canon: If there aren’t enough cops and it’s a beauractic nightmare anyway, it might not be that hard for say, an entire city block to stop paying taxes and turn themselves into an autonomus commune if they didn’t actively pick fights.
***Drive your friend’s crappy speeder at the truck hard enoug and you could LITERALLY knock an arms dealer over.
**** Hunter 1, new on the job: “WHAT IS THAT HIDEOUS CREATURE???” Hunter 2: “What? Oh, that’s Eyeless Bob. Say Hi Bob!” Bob: *Throaty, wet gibbering noises and flailing* Hunter 2: “HA! You’re hilarious.” Hunter 1: “You can understand him?” Hunter 2: “Sure, it takes a bit to get used to his accent but he’s a riot at parties.”
Aw man this has potential for a short story/RPG characters/Art, but its 3 AM and i oughtta go to bed.
-Dark Meat Hunters are rarely solo- it’s way easier to take down a Mutant Pig-Rat the size of a minivan when you’ve got some friends and maybe a riding animal to help you. it’s also a lot easier to hold down a good territiory or keep your books and sell your prey at market if you’ve got some friends who can do patrols and bookeeping and sales for you.
-Hence, most Dark meat Hunters are part of “gangs” which is Imperialst for “Community organization that doesn’t pay taxes”, that contain not only multiple types of hunters, but other food-generating professions, managment and in the larger groups, quality control to make sure whatever you dredged up isn’t going to sicken important clients.
-Some of the other food-generating operations include: Hydroponic farming in empty warehouses that still have sewerhookups, insect farming, fungal farming, water collection and purification, Deep fishing and Grand Theft Basil.
-Seriously, spices are at a premium and worth killing for in the half-starved mid and lower levels. There’s big money in ripping off fancy restaurants or rich people for seasoning.
-Hunters identify themselves with luminescent face and body paint, both to show they’re not prey and to identify what Clan they belong to. It’d be pretty dumb to get speared by your buddy just becuase he thought you were a rival gang member. Luminescent paint is also camoflage- many animals living in the sunless lower levels of Coruscant are bioluminescent themselves, to attract mates and rey, and to blend in with the neons.
-Speaking of Levels, consider: If the average Cloud Cover level is “0″
Cloud-Level: 0-1 miles below cloud cover, rich bitches. The senate, a good portion of the jedi temple and Padme Amidala’s penthouse are up here.
Upper Level: 1-2 mi below cloud cover, upper-class-but-not-the-1%, sa bit of an economic dead zone- food is delivered regularly enough that shortages are rare. If you’re sneaky you can do hydroponic farming, process water or insect farm. You’ll need guards, engineers to fix the sewer and powerlines, probably a few biologists with student loans, and someone to manage the beuacratic end of things (whether that’s bribery or a string of mssing tax collectors is up to the clan)
Mid-Level: 2-3 mi blow cc: middle-class to poor, this is where dark food is sold, without the payment of taxes. limited light, limited power, MASSIVE shortages, this is where markets happen. Clan fights for control can get bitter and extremely voilent but are rarely public- the masses are already scared and desperate, open violence will only incite more violence and reduce sales. Public clan fights take the form of verbal taunting a vicious rumor mill. Once out of the market, things can get nasty- there’s a persistent rumor about the Dark Markets that if you piss of one of the clans enough, you could end up being their wares the next day.
Lower Level: 3-4 mi cc: Poor, actually less populated than the Mid-Level, almost no sunlight. This is where game starts to appear- escaped exotics from the pet trade, mutant rats, invasive small and medium game that’s adapted to city life. Wookies, Togruta, Trandoshans, and Rodians dominate the species makeup of the Hunters, many of them bringing thier planet-of-origin’s hunting traditions and hunting animals with them. Humans, Twi’lekk and other populous meat-eating species are common too, and many operate Hunt-Adjacent businesses, like trap and weapon maunfacurers, Kennels, bait-makers, outfitters and guides.
“Bottom” level: 4-4.5 mi cc. About 4,5 miles down from the highest buildings is most of coruscant’s water table. Sections of it are acessible and are filled with billions of tons of blind sewer fish. Fishing’s a risky business- some of those fish are the size of tiberian freighters. This is also where many of the large carnivores like urban Nexu, narglatches and rancors live, where they don’t have to compete with the citizenry for food. Also down here are the ruins of the first civilization of coruscant, and open sections of former city filled with dark-growing mushrooms, extoic plants and all kinds of treasures, many of which can poison or eat you too. High risk, high reward, requires a biology degree to mine properly
4.5 miles and lower: Byssal level.Entirely underground (or underwater) , this is where the cnothic people (eyeless pale and slightly cannibalistic humanoids) live, and thier secrets are not easily given up. Poorly mapped and barely explored, “delving” here combines aspects of spelunking, mining, cartography, archeology and sheer dumb luck. People have come back with amazing things- original Kolto cultures, ancient force-user artifacts, paper books , but they also come back changed- hypersensitive to light and sound, and a little looser on the ethics of potentially eating members of your dig team
If i ever GM a Star War I’m stealing this for my game
Steal Away! And tell me all about it, this is a concept I highly encourage people to take and use in games/fic/art whatever!
I couldn’t rest until I made my vision a reality, we don’t have enough content of luke being a badass
The Clone Wars lean really heavily into classical fencing, so I always get surprised at how differently Luke fights with a light sabre. If you actually watch his footwork and his body he’s very brutal about it. Less grace and more power. It’s such a beautiful contrast, whether it was intentional or not.
Do you think the star wars universe has like.. a trigger discipline equivalent for the lightsaber. like people on the internet will see a picture of a beginner jedi holding the sword and they’ll go “LOL wrist not set at 30° perpendicular to the right hip bone. have fun losing your hand you idiot”
