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imarvelatthestars · 7 months

Text

A Little More Alive

Pairings: Tai x werewolf!Reader (gender neutral)

Warnings: sfw - mentions of animal hunting for sustenance (not pleasure), brief depictions of brief body horror (human to wolf transformation) but nothing explicit, Tai and reader are both "outsiders" and receive some poor treatment because of it, mention of side character's death (again, not explicit), happy ending

Notes: this is not a part of the Tai Saga, but is its own and entirely separate story made specifically for Halloween/autumn time. However, I did add a few nods to the story here and there. (I'll probably be writing lots of little Tai stories from here on out that aren't connected to the saga, just fyi.)

Recommended Listening: Beyond the Forest by Howard Shore (or Feast of Starlight).

The people in this town are a fearful lot - superstitious, suspicious of everything and everyone around them. They fear the woods more than anything. There is some sense in this fear, after all there are things that lurk in the shadows there that no human ought to comprehend. But the woods are not evil. They bring life to everything they touch, shelter for those in need, food for all, and the forest floor is often dappled with puddles, creeks, and ponds.

To you, it's home. Cool in the summers, pleasant and abundant in the spring and autumn, but the winters are hard. You tend to spend your winters in town instead because here there are fires, hearths decorated with cast iron pots that overflow with stews and warm, hearty meals that fill your belly and leave you satisfied. It's not so bad here. But it is lonely.

There is no family to stay with, no parent to hold you on chilly nights and now siblings to offer their comfort when you fall to your lowest, and there is no one to tell your secrets to. The townsfolk are wary of you, but friendly enough when they need to be, when they want something from you.

"Stranger, I need a hare for my family." "I need a deer for the equinox feast." "Get me the best fowl you can find, hunter, and I'll make it worth your while."

Not all of them are greedy, but most of them are. Not him, though. He's not like the others. The chill of the autumn and winter months lingers in their eyes year round, but his eyes are warm. They remind you of the undergrowth in the forest. The frogs and their tadpoles bathing in the mud, the squirrels and birds that build their homes in the tree trunks, the color of the leaves as they turn and fall. The hearth in midwinter, when the fire is sparking and the wood turns to embers, and the bread bakes in the oven and cracks and steams in your hands. He's kind, this man who sits in the dirt everyday and asks for the things he cannot afford.

You wonder if a man like him, with kindness in his bones, would still be so if he knew your secret. If he knew who it was that left him scraps in the dark of the night. You hope he isn't like the others in this regard, but you're too afraid to ever try and find out. For now, your secret is safe and your friend is, too.

This night is the first that's been properly cold. The weather has been fickle this week, hot one day and cool the next, but never dipping too low. Tonight, however, it's caught everyone by surprise. Some families haven't gathered enough firewood yet, so their chimneys aren't smoking. The few stragglers still out after dark are shivering in their boots, too cold to notice the shadow darting by or the coat of wolf fur around your shoulders.

You make into the forest and strip off your clothes, fold them neatly and tuck them into a hollow in a fallen trunk, then you lay out the fur on the moss and curl up on top of it, waiting. It takes a moment for you to relax, but once you do, you feel something stir deep in your stomach. You've waited too long to transform, put it off for too many days. It's going to be painful this time.

And it is. Your bones creak and snap before reknitting themselves into a wolf's skeleton, this is how it always is, but it hurts so much more than it has in ages. Your joints are sore and your gums hurt where your teeth have transformed into canines, your spine aches right where your tail sprouts out, and your muscles are on fire. But finally, it's over and you feel like yourself again.

The moon is only half full and doesn't illuminate the earth enough for human eyes, but for your eyes it's perfect. You can hear everything, every twitch of a whisker, every twig snapped underfoot, every heartbeat going pitter patter, and you can see the glassy, frightened eyes of little critters hiding beneath overgrown ferns.

You hunt. There is an old hare whose mate died earlier this month. HIs sorrow is so strong that you can smell it and it makes him slow. It's better to take his life than the life of the mother around the bend; she guards five tiny little hearts going pitter patter and that is a line you cannot, will not cross. You thank the old hare for his life and the life he will now be able to give to others, and then you move on. His body rests by the tree trunk that holds your clothes. Soon he's joined by a pair of chipmunks, a squirrel, another hare, and a bird whose wing never healed right. Most of your finds will go to those in town - the single mother making stew for her children, the angry old grandfather who lives in the smithy and yells at everyone, the young widower and his baby girl - but you always save something.

The chipmunks and bird are dropped off first, then the squirrel, then one of the hares.

"There you are," he rumbles, the tiny fire he's built illuminating the dimples in his cheeks when he turns to look at you. "Was wondering where you'd gone off to."

Your paws pad lightly on freshly fallen leaves, and the hare falls at the man's feet. You nudge it lightly with your nose before sitting back on your hind legs.

"For me, hm?"

You pant. It's your way of saying "yes, of course".

"That's very generous for an old veteran."

If you were human, you'd roll your eyes. As a wolf, you settle for a moody huff and leave it at that. He often says things like this when you come visit him, that he's old and not worth your time, that a handsome young wolf like yourself ought to be spending time with its pack instead of visiting him. He speaks sometimes of days long past when he was younger and stronger, a soldier in the Emperor's legion, but never enough for you to grasp what happened to him or why he's now a pauper who can only beg for scraps.

But you can sense things in this form that your human form can't. All your senses are more finely attuned, sharper, clearer. You can smell the pain he hides. It's stronger when it's cold. Perhaps the weather makes it worse. Whatever it is, it's in his leg. It seems to radiate from his ankle, up his shin, and into his thigh.

"You must be hungry after all that hunting," he says as he pokes at the fire. The tray he uses to collect coins and food from the locals is balanced above it. He then pats the space beside him. "Stay. We'll share."

A wolf's face cannot flush with heat or embarrassment the way that a human's can, but the quickened beating of the heart is the same, the rush of hormones in the blood. Do you panic, do you stay, do you go? You want to stay. You like him. He's the safest thing you have beyond the forest. But he's no fool. He must know you're no ordinary wolf. Wild wolves aren't like you, they aren't nearly as friendly and nowhere near as considerate. And he speaks to you like you understand him, like he can hear the very human thoughts running through your head.

"Stay, wuruhi. I won't bite." His tone is soft and his mouth is smiling. He probably thinks he's funny.

"I shouldn't be seen with you," you say, but it comes out more like "rrrrrgh oooowa". It could be dangerous for him if you linger. But then you pause, trace your eyes over his profile as the fire illuminates it, you see the creases by his eyes and the gray in his beard. You wonder if he's as lonely as you are here. You wonder if it wouldn't be so bad to stay for a bit, just this once.

You huff again, somewhere between irritated and resigned, and walk around the edge of the fire to come to his other side. You have to be gentle, you don't want to jostle him too much and make him hurt more, but finally you find a comfortable position and rest your chin on his thigh. The pain still radiates through his sinew and bone, but you sense his body react to your warmth almost immediately. Hopefully this will help.

The night is soon filled with the smell of cooked rabbit. He feeds you for the first time since this unofficial partnership began. He's hesitant at first, and wisely so, but he doesn't need to be afraid of you. You'd never do a thing to hurt him.

It's easy to drift to sleep then with your belly mostly full and the fire warming your paws and nose. His body is soft and comfortable, like something you've been longing for all this time but never even knew was possible to have. His hand is broad and warm when it settles atop your head just between your ears, and you find yourself thinking that this is... nice. Better than the forest and better than the tavern full of raucous drunkards.

Everything is warm when you wake up, almost stiflingly so. Your entire torso is nearly overheated, although your limbs and nose are a little cooler than that. Your first thought is that you added too many layers when you went to bed last night, but then you properly open your eyes and see that you're outside. It's startling for a moment, but not entirely unexpected. You've fallen asleep outside after more arduous transformations before. But that doesn't seem right. You don't remember falling asleep in the forest, and you realize now that you're not even in the forest, you're...

The weary veteran is snoring behind you. The sun has crested above the trees and hilltops and distant mountains. It's daytime and the moon is gone, and you're still a wolf, but you're out in the open. Exposed. Visible. Vulnerable. His little camp is just on the edge of town by the main path that leads to other towns and kingdoms beyond this one. Anyone could see, anyone could ask.

You wriggle up and out of his arms in an instant, tail tucked between your legs as you start to panic. You're so disoriented from your heavy sleep that for a moment, you can't remember where your things are. Your clothes, your shoes. The things that make you human. Where are they? What if someone sees you? What if they know, somehow, just what you are? What if, what if, what if-?

The leaves and dirt scrape and shift behind you, and you turn on your heels, teeth bared and ears pinned back, ready to fight, only to see him. The veteran. His bark brown eyes and ember sparked freckles. His hands are raised and he's withdrawn into the little fence he'd fallen asleep against.

"Easy, wuruhi, easy. 's just me."

Your mouth snaps shut and your ears prick forward a bit. You'd never hurt him. Never. It hurts to think that you've scared him, but you don't have time for this, you have to get out of there before someone sees.

He tilts his head to the side just slightly, likely eyeing the fur that's raised along the ridge of your spine and tail. "What's got you worked up? Hm?"

A rooster crows just inside town. A sharp breeze whistles between the houses and barns. The nearest house creaks when its front door opens. You turn to run and you don't look back.

You make it back to the tavern and you don't leave until hours later, not until your heartbeat has evened out and the adrenaline has stopped pumping through your veins and you stop hearing voices clamoring to chase you out of town.

That was too close. You let your guard down. You can't afford to do that again. As much as you don't like some of the people here, this town gives you a purpose to focus your time on, people to interact with and casual friendships to make, the money you need for clothes and finer, pretty things that you aren't able to craft.

You sigh as you press your forehead to the door of your room.

You can't let yourself close to him like that again. It's not safe for you and you can only imagine what might happen to him if he were seen interacting with a creature like you...

Monsters. Beasts. Demons. These are the words the folk in the tavern use when they tell stories late into the evening and the days grow shorter. "Beware the wolf that roams these woods" is the warning bestowed to travelers. "He'll tear your throat from your chest and feast on your heart." They laugh and shiver and drink from their tankards, and then one will nudge another and say, "and avoid that old beggar on the road."

Those stories hurt more than the ones they tell about your kind. You know the truth of living a life half between wolf and human. You were never cursed by a witch, never damned by the devil, nor abandoned by your mother for being the foul offspring she never wanted. You were simply born like this and your family was lost long ago to hunters and soldiers, fearful townsfolk like these who start at every shadow. But the things they say about the man with the gentle eyes and tired smile makes your blood boil.

They don't know what they're saying, who they're speaking in the presence of. They don't know that he's yours to protect, or even that he's worth protecting. All they know is their simple, pathetic existences and crass jokes made into beer foam and hissed between moldy teeth. They're fools.

But some good still comes from their mockery. It reminds you that the "old" beggar is still alone, probably wondering what happened to the wolf who fell asleep warming his injured leg. And he's probably hungry. It's been several days since you brought him something.

You eye the credits you've most recently earned and count them up, then catch a glimpse out the window. Sunset isn't for a few more hours; you still have time and opposable thumbs.

Hardly an hour later, you've purchased a bundle of potatoes, turnips, apples, and old bread, and are marching out to the edge of town. It's nerve-wracking, this decision to finally interact with him as a human, and you're half convinced he'll see right through you. He won't, of course, he has no reason to even suspect you, but you're nervous all the same. Your stomach's all knotted up and your heart's in your throat. So many "what-ifs", so many worries and anxieties, so many unknowns, and it's stupid really because he's always been kind and gentle, never been a threat to you. Why do you even care so much about how he might react?

"Hello," you say when you finally see him. It's about all you can say, but it's embarrassing that it's all you can muster for your very first conversation.

He doesn't start - must have heard you coming - but he does look curiously at you. As if he can't figure you out. Or maybe he thinks you look familiar. You really, really hope that isn't it.

His response is halting and unsure. He nods at you. "Hello."

Your arm shoots out of its own accord and the bundle swings wildly in the air. "I thought you might be hungry."

His eyes flicker, sizing up the bundle, sizing up you, curious, searching, questioning, but... grateful. It's not easy to miss the way his shoulders relax and slope just a bit. "Thank you. That's very kind."

Your body switches to moving on instinct and you soon find yourself on a knee, just across from the spot where you'd fallen asleep with him before. The bundle is handed over and the new rabbit skin gloves that cover his knuckles catch your eye. Roughly sewn, some fur missing in spots where his knife or your teeth must have caught, but clearly made by his own hands. It strikes you as oddly sentimental despite being the smartest, most logical thing he could have done. He didn't make them because the hare came from you, he made them because he was cold and winter is coming, you know this, but still. He preserved your little tooth marks. He keeps them close to him. It may mean nothing to him, but you find that it means everything to you.

So you return to him once night falls and the moon is out, against your better judgement. You can't help it. You want to see him again, you want to see if he enjoyed the food, if your human presence is something he wouldn't mind sitting with again.

"How is it?" you ask when you come trotting out of the woods, but it's muffled by the critter in your jaws and comes out something like, "ghghghgh ooofgh".

He smiles when he sees you. "There you are, little one." He scratches you behind the ears before you've even dropped it for him and it's so embarrassing, but your tail starts wagging. Like any number of the stray dogs that enjoy attention from the townsfolk, even from you. "'s good t' see you again," he chuckles.

Your nose nudges the sack of food from earlier, played off to look as if you're curious or seeking out an interesting smell.

"You smell that, huh? It's from a friend."

I know. But it makes you feel good to hear it.

"It'll make a good meal for us, eh?"

And it's then that you wonder when you went so soft for a man you hardly know. He cooks for you and tells you stories while you lounge at his feet. He tells you about his big brother, Appo, and his commander, Rex. He tells you about the blade he took to his shin and the cannon explosion that sent shrapnel into his knee. Most importantly, he tells you his name and it's something you immediately tuck inside your heart.

It suits him, this single syllable.

"It means 'the coast' or 'the tide'. It was my father's tongue." He seems distant when he explains this, like he's no longer here with you. "He was from a land far, far away from here. An island kingdom. Full of warriors and great chiefs."

You rest your head on his knee and exhale softly through your nose. "Tell me more," you whine. It's a tricky translation.

He doesn't seem to understand you because he shifts and runs his palm over the scruff at your neck. "I know several tongues, but I don't know yours. Don't even know your name." He smiles, Tai smiles, and scratches your shoulder. "Don't suppose you'd ever tell me, would you?"

"I'm a wolf," you grumble, something like "ooowa woogh", which only makes him laugh.

"Perhaps one day, wuruhi iti."

He does eventually learn your name, though he doesn't know it belongs to the wolf that visits him most nights. There are moments when it seems he might, when he looks at you for a little too long in either form and you think your cover is blown, but it never is. He remains steadfast long into winter and you remain his, loathe to admit it though you are.

And then the worst happens. The shadows become too dark and too long, and the townsfolk become too afraid tucked away in their timber and stone homes, huddled around their hearths. Maybe you became too at home in the warmth of Tai's fire and you let yourself get lazy when it came to covering your tracks. But one day the people present arms and they come for the wolf they've heard tale of on the darkest nights.

You don't realize what's happening at first. You think maybe you've missed out on another festival with all your distractions of late, so you follow the crowd to the fence at the edge of town.

"Find the wolf!" someone shouts, and your blood runs cold. Several silver blades are brandished in the air.

"Get up, old man!" "Tell us where the wolf is!" "Give up the monster!"

Tai. Oh God, they know. How could they know? You were so careful. Had you really become so careless?

He struggles to his feet with a grunt and leans heavy on the fence. His eyes are tired in the light of their torches, weary and unsure. "What is this?"

The mayor steps forward. "Where is the wolf, old man?"

This the moment you've been dreading. He's sure to give you up, any human would. To them, you're just another monster that stalks their dreams and lingers at the forest's edge. You were foolish to ever think otherwise, even for him.

But when you turn to leave, he speaks. "What wolf?"

You pause, back still turned, too afraid to see his face, too afraid to hope.

"The werewolf. Your hellhound."

Tai scoffs. "I have no such thing." You turn.

"Liar!" One of the local women scrambles through the crowd then, her torch burning brightly as she brandishes a pitchfork in her other hand. "I saw you! You were talking to it, casting spells into the fire!"

"I am no witch, nor am I warlock or any other caster of spells. I'm simply a man."

"Are you lying to cover for the creature?" asks the mayor, now getting so close that his spittle catches on Tai's beard. "Or are you one of them? A demon sent to damn us?"

How can they say such things? How can they even dare to think them? Do they not see? Can they not comprehend? Have they no fear? If he were really the wolf, shouldn't they be afraid of his wrath? Or has their stupidity outweighed their senses?

To his credit, Tai doesn't rise to his bait. "You'd like that. Wouldn't you?" He smiles, but his dimples lack their usual depth and his eyes are cold for the first time. Cold like freshly dug earth over a grave. "I'm as human as you are, Lord Mayor. And even if I knew where your so-called beast was, I wouldn't say."

He's a better man than you are. Because you are seconds away from ripping this town apart.

"You'll tell us."

He just blinks. It's not a verbal refusal, but it's as clear as day. Their search ends with him.

But stories like this never end there, do they? You've heard of them from other wolves, ones less fortunate than you. Humans, when pushed to the limits of their wildest fears, are more monstruous than any wolf you've ever known. You know bloodlust when you see it, you know it because you feel it now, bubbling and broiling inside you as you fight with everything you have not to let it consume you. You know this town is dying of thirst and they will see red tonight, whether it's your blood or someone else's.

You run. You're not even out of sight, you're simply tucked under the roofing of the nearest dwelling. You pull your clothes off with enough force to tear them and you don't even bother with your undergarments, you just throw the wolf fur onto the ground and curl up on top. You gaze up at the sky where it begins to turn from pale blue to midnight black, and you summon yourself. It's all a rush of adrenaline and blood in your ears and fur melding with skin, senses coming into focus, limbs shortening, growing, folding, until you are one with yourself again, and then you howl.

There's no need to translate it, they all know what it means: death. You skirt around the edge of the crowd with your teeth bared, snarling, snapping at anyone who dares to step too close, and you barrel right into the mayor, knock him down so that he tumbles into the fence and takes it with him. The torch goes flying, the silver blade in his hand drops, and he screams.

You never liked him anyway. Too greedy and conniving to care much for the people of this town. His life won't be missed by many.

When you've had your fill, you saunter off of his body and begin to pace the gap between Tai and the others. Most of them are horrified, too shocked to even move, let alone try and fight you. Good. There are a few here that you've come to like during your stay and you'd hate to kill them. But you will. As a wolf, your life centers around your pack. The pack is yours to protect with your life, and this is the promise you have sealed with the blood of a human. There is no going back.

"Let him go." They don't understand you exactly, but they get the idea. Tai is off limits.

It takes a while for them to back down. They could perhaps overpower you, but you think the sight of their leader bleeding out has put them off attempting anything more without him. The torches become distant dots of light as the people retreat to their homes. Doors and shutters slam shut, the whole town goes quiet, and the sun falls below the horizon. The only light left is that of the stars and the embers of Tai's fire.

You pounce on him the moment you deem it safe. He yelps a little at first, startled and very probably afraid of you, but you don't care. Better afraid than dead. All that matters is seeing if he's safe. Your tongue is darting out across his skin, your nose sniffing under his tunic and his beard. Is he safe, is he safe, is he hurt. It's all you can think. Even if he hates you now. Even if this was all for nothing because you took a life for him and by human standards, that should disgust him. Even if you never see him again after this night, all you need to know is if he will survive.

He starts saying words. They sound so foreign to you that you think at first he's saying his father's tongue, the language he sometimes mumbles in or uses to call to you. But no, it's your name. Your real name. The one you gave him as a human. The one he isn't supposed to know is yours.

His hands come to gently cup your cheeks. You're still a wolf, yet he holds you now as if you were as human as he is.

"Is that you, wuruhi iti?"

What do you do? What do you say? "I killed someone for you. I'd die for you. You're mine, do you understand?"

Tai says your name again and the entire world stops. You whine. This is so much more painful than you thought it would be, this not knowing.

"It is, isn't it?"

Your tongue lolls out a bit when you whimper. "Yes, yes! It's me!" You want to howl it from the mountaintops, but you settle for licking his nose and panting.

He smiles. His cheeks dimple, and his eyes are the same type of warmth you find in the fires he's been lighting for you for the last few months, sparking the kind of embers you didn't even know you were capable of. He's warm again, not cold like the steel of a wolf killer's blade, but cozy like the forest floor after a day in the sun, soft like the hide of a hare. Home like the forest has always been.

"How did you know?" you ask later under the light of the full moon, your wolf fur laid across the back of the stolen cart and your head tucked under his arm.

The town is long gone, so far behind you that it is little more than a bad memory, though you hope none of them gets a wild hair and decides to come after you. As far as you're concerned, this cart and the goods you stole from the mayor's house are yours and Tai's now. The horse, too. If anyone is foolish enough to try and steal from you, then their fate is on their own head.

He grunts. He keeps falling asleep on you, even though he's trying hard to stay awake. "Know what?"

You butt him in the cheek with your nose. "That it was me."

"Oh." Tai laughs. "It was your eyes. I'd know them anywhere."

Now that you're human, you can feel it when your entire body flushes. What a silly reaction to such a simple statement, but you can't help it. He's been so gentle with you since you transformed, never touching anywhere that might be inappropriate or too presumptuous, never lingering for too long, but always comforting, always there.

"Really?"

"You're different, ipo. Special."

A lifetime of hearing otherwise from other humans has you feeling utterly speechless and a little breathless at his admittance. "How so?"

He hums as he tilts his head back to watch the stars. "You took care of me. Still not sure why you did, but I'm grateful all the same." His arm tightens around your shoulders. "And then you came to me as a human and you looked at me, and I just knew. Couldn't bear to lose you after that."

Your throat is threatening to close on you, your eyes are misty. "Tai..."

"Something about you made me feel a little more alive and far less alone. Thank you."

There's something growing in your throat now, something beyond the tears or the awkward tightness they cause, something you've been hesitant to name but never hesitant to act on. Something you've known for some time but never dared to voice.

"Tai, I don't regret what I did." He looks as if he wants to say something when you pause, but he holds it for a moment, waits for you to continue first. "For those like me, other wolves..." And he doesn't cringe, doesn't shy away from the word. He stays. "It's a promise that you're part of my pack. I, I know that this is not exactly normal for you, and I wouldn't want you to stay with me if you didn't wish to, if perhaps you were afraid of me-"

"I'm not."

Your belly feels warm with this knowledge.

You may as well say it. With the stars in his eyes and the moon highlighting the swell of his nose like some majestic carving in a noble family's manor, he doesn't look like the haggard veteran you've always known him as. You see something beautiful. But then, he's always been sort of beautiful to you.

"I care about you. I'd kill for you, I'd do it all again, I swear, just to keep you safe. And if you don't feel the same, I would understand, but Tai." Why is it so hard to say? Just spit it out! "I think that I love you. And I would like to stay with you, however you'll have me."

You wonder momentarily if that sheen in his eyes is just the reflection of the moon.

"Wuruhi iti." His fingers are shaking when they trace your browline. "I'm an old man trying to make his way in this wide world. Why would you stay with me?"

You smile. "I happen to like you, old man. And you're not so old as you seem."

"Perhaps not, but there are others you might spend your time on. Younger humans, less damaged. Other wolves."

"I will go if you ask me to."

But please don't. Such a request would break your heart.

Finally, he shakes his head and your lungs surge with relief. "I could never. I'm too selfish." He slips something into your palm then, and presses your fist to his lips before settling it on your breastbone.

"What's this?"

He rumbles a bit while he tries to find the words. Is he suddenly feeling bashful? "Token of my gratitude."

The moonlight reveals a small piece of wood, sanded and carved so intricately that you can only make out all the details through touch. There are all sorts of whirling spirals and delicate lines latticing the wood, so many that at first you don't realize there's something more to the design. Then you raise it a little higher and squint, and you see the shape of a wolf's head come into focus.

"It's beautiful."

"Whakairo. Another piece of my father and the land he came from. These carvings were the ways which our ancestors would tell stories. This one is ours." He brushes his thumb over one section of the wood. "Our fire." Then to another section. "The hares and the turnips. And you."

Every inch of your body is about to burst from beneath your skin. How are you so fortunate to have met this strange, wonderful man? But - "Where are you?"

His hands closes around the wood. "I'm here." Then he reaches, slowly, waiting until you nod to move any further, and taps his fingers on your collarbone. "And here. If you'll have me."

You will always have him, and he will always have you.

māori translations:

wuruhi - wolf

wuruhi iti - little wolf

ipo - beloved, sweetheart

whakairo - carving (the wh- is pronounced like f-)

my submission for @anxiouspineapple99 's big clone halloween party

prompts: werewolf + "something about you made me feel a little more alive and far less alone"

& "i saw it happen" (reworded into "i saw you") from the @clonexreaderbingo event

tai taglist: @dystopicjumpsuit @clonemedickix @multi-fan-dom-madness @deejadabbles @moodymisty @rain-on-kamino @temple-elder @wanderer-six @jambolska-grozdova @bambambunny @andrakass2 @wings-and-beskar @arandomnerdsblog578 @roadara23 @wizardofrozz @kakashibabe02

please let me know if you would like to be added to or taken from this list!

#clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #tai x you #clone trooper x reader #clone trooper tai #tai #star wars #werewolf au #x reader #also i know the picture shows a skirt but there is no gendered language or descriptions of reader. so it's gender neutral!#wow!!! the first time i've written something completely chronologically with no later additions. and the first time in a LONG time where #...there was no actual kissing despite there being romance #i am so proud of this one and i love it so much #it's beenr attling around inside my head for several days now and i'm glad i got it out and finished

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moodymisty · 10 months

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requests are open???????? oh??????? okay okay hear me out, I know this might seem weird but I just love how you write for our clones and since I know you love him as much as I do..... what about "finding out they have a momento of you somewhere on them they bring everywhere" + Tai? 👉🏻👈🏻

Author's note: -yanks a barbie-like doll version of Tai from your hands- He's mine to play with now >:3 and I shall make his life perfect and full of fluff as he deserves. I can't be mean to him on my first time writing him xD

Also Wrecker, since you mentioned him in another message. His is a small bonus featured at the bottom ;3

Relationships: Tai(homeless clone veteran from Kenobi to anyone unawares)/Gn!Reader, Wrecker/Gn!Reader

Warnings: None

Your friends had always insisted you had a bleeding heart. But you never really got why it was always considered something you say about someone to insult them.

You care for other people; Is that so bad?

Well, here maybe. There's no shortage of individuals looking to take advantage of that. But you're careful, it's not like you would've gotten far if you hadn't been. But sometimes you can't help it. You'd lost count of how many times you'd come out to give him some food, as he sat camped out close by the entrance to your work.

"I," He hadn't heard you at first, your voice filtered into the crowd and was carried away by it. You spoke again, louder; With more confidence, you had thought.

"I brought you another."

When you'd finally caught his attention he turned to you, the brightness of his eyes contrasting against the still somewhat disheveled nature of his hair and beard. He'd trimmed some of it not too long ago, but in the situation he was in, it was difficult to find the proper tools to do so.

You'd handed him one of the two mealboxes in your hand- it's still warm on the bottom as your fingers brush over his gloved ones. He had hesitated, but after the last few times where you had, and quite aggressively insisted, he take the food, this time he just takes it.

"You're beginning to make a habit of this," His thumb fiddled with the tab to pull up the lid and take a peek at what was inside. "You know you don't have to."

He makes good company, and you don't hesitate to say as such.

"There's some storage crates behind the store; Do you maybe want to eat together?"

You were never able to stop the expectant look on your face, maybe hoping to puppy dog eyes him into joining you. It had seemed to work, but who knows if it was the pleading tone of just the offer of some company.

He went to haul himself to his feet, so you reached out a hand. He didn't exactly shove it away, but he didn't take it; Standing fully and giving you a small smile. It still surprises you sometimes how tall he is at full height, especially with those thick plastoid boots adding another chunk of height.

"I'm not that old." Putting the hand back on your mealbox, it had been hard not to teasingly roll your eyes.

"You said it, not me."

To think, that felt like so long ago.

It really hadn't been, but time passes so wonderfully slow sometimes when you're around him. And how lucky you'd ended up, now getting to say 'good morning', instead of 'good night'.

The blankets still cover your legs, looking to the side as you watch him dump out his ratty old bag all over his side of the bed. You can tell he still doesn't think he should be here, but you were quick to give him his own little spaces of his. He deserves it, and you want him here.

Various little things come tumbling out out his worn rucksack; Some credits, a roll of bandages, a piece of candy and an empty blaster mag, even.

He's such an early riser- you're not even out of your nightclothes and he's up and moving. Already gave you a kiss and made a cup of caf.

You'd bought Tai a new satchel when you noticed the rips and holes in his current one, that were making it nearly unable to fulfill it's purpose as a bag. The one you'd bought wasn't anything fancy, but part of you had been concerned about implying he replace the old one and finding out it had sentimental value. Thankfully it didn't seem to, and now he's eager to make use of your gift.

Shaking it once more a piece of foil also comes tumbling out with his various doodads, and given it looks looks like nothing else he owns, you decide to curiously reach for it. He doesn't vocalize that you shouldn't touch it, but you still hesitate just a moment to make sure you aren't snooping.

He looks at you and then the foil in your hands, before giving a soft smile that shifts his grey speckled stubble.

"Open it."

Carefully the crumpled metal makes noise as you unfold the edges, before revealing what's inside on your lap.

A flower is pressed and dried, wrapped up in the foil. The stem is cracked from being folded to fit in such a small pack, but it's still secured with the actual petals.

"Is this," You question, even though you think you know where this is from. Not too many plants have the chance to grow and blossom in this sort of smoggy, dirty city.

It must've been blown down from a rooftop garden not too long before you'd both walked by, it late into the night and both your bellies full from some hot, cheap food. The flower had been a bright blue just like the fading paint on his armor, and picking up off the ground you managed to save it from getting stepped on- holding it up to his chestplate. Commenting on the color match had made him smile, before he stuck it in the hair right above your ear.

You don't remember ever taking it out, so it must've fallen sometime during the night and he'd snatched it back up. There had been so much happening; The smell of food and booze, Imperial troopers chasing a mugger, Tai had an arm around you the entire time, and it had tightened with they came a bit too close. That warm feeling had made your stomach turn in knots.

"Why'd you keep it?" You're curious, gently rubbing one of the petals between your thumb and index finger. It's so soft, even the slightest touch and you're nervous you'll ruin it.

He must've had this safely in his satchel for weeks now, and you'd never even known.

"Thought that even if you didn't stick around, I'd still remember having fun that night." He didn't get many of those sorts of days, not after everything that's happened. So much of his life has just been survive to the next day; Next hour, next minute.

"You know," Gently folding the flower back up in it's foil you still hold it in your hand, glancing towards him. "I was already in love with you when you gave me this."

There still exists a small degree of self doubt that exists in him; That he's not the right man for you. Though after vehemently denying it and insisting he stay when he tried to beat himself into leaving your home, you do everything in your power to make sure he has no reason to think those things.

Your confession made him falter for a moment, as you look at him with those sweet, irresistible eyes.

Putting his knee on the bed he moves closer to you, eyebrows raised as his slightly hooded eyes stare you down. He's still a little bit sleepy since the caf hasn't quite kicked in, and neither of you have eaten yet. He's been wanting to make it, he says to make up for all those meals you gave him.

"Did it make you love me more?" You put the flower down safely out of the way, so it isn't as risk of getting crushed when you lean forward and meet him at the middle; Nose just brushing against his. You want to kiss him so fucking bad, feeling his beard against your skin when you mutter your answer.

"There's no words to describe how much it did."

✦ Bonus! Some Wrecker goodness ✦

Wrecker always runs so hot; On a cold planet like this, it's particularly nice.

He makes this sort of heat bubble, that radiates around him like the burning sun of a solar system. Warming up your thighs with the arm leaning across them, he does so as well with your back and side as he uses his other arm to pull you against his chest. Sitting sideways in his lap is nice, especially as you watch the stars.

This is the sort of thing normally makes you quite sleepy- though it doesn't help that Wrecker insists on being the most comfortable sleeping spot. At least this time it won't be terrible if you end up falling asleep, because at least he'll be here to wake you back up. Or keep an eye on everything for you.

He occasionally has to check the scanners, leaning forward to do so when he feels enough time has passed without taking a glance. The continuously snow obscures vision outside the viewports of The Marauder to a degree, but it's not bad enough that you can't see the sky. It is however, bad enough that you have to keep an eye on the scanners to check if anything is getting close, lest you end up noticing only when something's right on top of you.

Not that anyone or thing, other than maybe what little wildlife can survive out here anyways would; It's just Hunter being cautious.

When Wrecker tightens his grip on your thighs a bit an leans forward to check, you notice something underneath the armor of his wrist, and gently reach to grasp his arm. Wrecker doesn't resist and lets you have his arm but he is a little confused, until you expose the thin chain that's wrapped around his body glove but underneath his gauntlet.

"I didn't know you kept this."

You remember way back when, on your first what you would call an 'official date', your necklace had snapped. It wasn't one that had any sort of extreme sentimental value, but you had really liked it; Though when Wrecker had picked it up off the ground to see multiple links were ruined, you elected to trash it.

Apparently Wrecker hadn't done that, and had instead used the long chain and tied it around his wrist with a haphazard double knot, the small little gold pendant long since having been lost.

"I, uh," Wrecker takes his arm away from your hands, and rubs the portion of his neck just below his ear. The chain is easily hidden underneath the plates of his armor, which more than explains why you'd never spotted it up until right now.

"It reminded me of that first date." He looks at you oddly for a moment, his brown eyes trying to read your expression. "It isn't weird, is it?" You shake your head.

"No, not at all. Maybe I can use some of Tech's tools so we can fix it? Then it won't fall off."

He noticeably perks up at that. His hand goes right back to cupping the side of your thigh, his gloved palm covering a good portion of it.

"Yeah, I really don't wanna loose it after this long."

Gods, Wrecker is too sweet for you.

"Well now you got to give me something of yours, so we can match. Right?" He almost instantly starts wracking his brain for ideas, his fingers tapping against your thigh.

"I got an idea," Your eyebrows raise, waiting. "But it's a surprise."

Of course it is.

He laughs as you drop your shoulders, having been denied the instant satisfaction of knowing what memento he's going to give you.

"Awww Wrecker come on, please? Tell me?" Your arms raise to wrap around his neck, attempting to pull him for a kiss, but his torso is too tall for you to get anywhere in this position. He pinches the side of your thigh, making you squeal just a bit.

"I'll tell you later. Promise."

#Tai got that 501st charm i know he do #the bad batch wrecker x reader #wrecker x reader #tai x reader #Wrecker/Reader #tbb x reader #homeless veteran x reader #clone trooper x reader #reader insert #reader #mywriting

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wild-karrde · 8 months

Note

#Fandom Friday!!!!

@imarvelatthestars made my week with posting not only one but TWO new chapters of Tai-Saga.

Transience and Persistence are such a great read. You'll have fun with them.

OOOOOH! I haven't gotten around to this series just yet, but I do love how much research and consideration Di has put into this fic. I adore the thought of using New Zealand sign language for the Tuskens and the tidbits that tie into North African culture for Tatooine. Those type of Easter eggs are just really neat in my very humble opinion and show how much care goes into a fic! Thanks so much for recommending these, Caro!

Participate in Fandom Friday to show your favorite creators from this week some love! :)

#FANDOM FRIDAY #creator appreciation #star wars #kenobi #clone trooper nax #clone trooper tai #tai x reader #tai x you #nax x reader #nax x you #clone veteran #obi-wan kenobi #kenobi series

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imarvelatthestars · 8 months

Text

Essence

Pairings: Clone Veteran (from Kenobi) Tai x f!Reader

Warnings: hoooo boy, there's some spice at the end of this one, but also some hurt/comfort feelings mixed in! oral (m receiving) and lots of dirty talk, hint of voyeurism and possible dom/sub vibes?

Notes: I really loved this chapter and I had fun playing around with their dynamic again. As for the filthy part, I don't have much real world experience with this particular act, so I hope it came out okay 💀

[previous chapter]

The marshal is wicked clever. She’s arranges for a tent for the two of you to share until morning, which isn’t far away but at least you’ll be able to get some rest before journeying back to town, and she spends the rest of the night making peace and special arrangements with the Tuskens.

Tuskens. Not Sand People. They are the stewards of the planet, according to Tilelli, the original people who cultivated the land and grew into a civilization. Not monsters, not a people to be feared but simply to be respected. And several nearby tribes all have peace with Mos Nefta thanks to her, this happened to be a desperate time and a special case of drought that has prevented their usual water sources from manifesting this season. The tribe is sick. That’s why they stole, that’s why Tai was endangered and Nej was injured. Not because of savage bloodlust, but because of desperate fear. You can understand this, but you’re still wary of them.

You do appreciate the tent, though. There are blankets and robes, and the walls of the tent are substantial enough to keep yours and Tai’s body heat in. It’s the first time in well over a week that you’ve both been able to be alone, although it feels like so much longer, and you’ve managed to worm yourself under his clothes and against his skin, a whisper of normalcy in the chaos that has become your life of late.

“Missed you,” you whisper into his sternum. It’s punctuated with a feather-light kiss to his skin.

His voice rumbles deep in his chest. “I’m here now, my love.”

There’s so much you want to say and it’s been weighing on you for a while now, but this doesn’t feel like the time or place to say it. You’re hesitant to shatter the beauty of the moment, to say anything that would even slightly push him away. You need him pressed against the entire length of you because you need to know for certain that he’s here with you.

“Don’t ever leave me again.”

You can feel his smile against the top of your head. “Couldn’t get rid of me if you tried, mesh’la.”

Another kiss to his chest, this one somewhere above his heart. “What’s that mean?”

“Beautiful.”

Oh, you like that. You gift him with another kiss in response, slightly higher than the last and more prolonged. The tent is too dark to make out his face, but that doesn’t matter. You have his face committed to memory already. “Should use that on you sometime, old man.”

“That’s the wrong word,” he chuckles. “Not meant for the likes of me.”

“Shut up.” Your fingers map out the approximate shape of his cheek and then lightly swat him there. “You’re beautiful to me. Your eyes, your smile.” Are you imagining it or is your chest literally aching with love for him? “I love the way your cheeks dimple. I love you, the way you smell.” Your nose drags up his chest to his neck where you bury yourself in him. Warm and sturdy. Safe. Home. “Mesh’la.” The word is strange on your tongue, but you love the way it sounds.

The dunes are quiet and the Tuskens have mellowed into assorted snoring patterns. You think you catch a hint of Tilelli’s voice at one point, but it’s too faint to be sure.

“You were brave today.”

And it makes you laugh because you felt anything but. “Well, you didn’t see me before. I wasn’t so brave then.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he says. “You’ve been brave for so many days. Too many.” He prompts your head back so he can kiss you properly. “I’m proud of you.”

Don’t be, you could say. Or, it was nothing. Let’s talk about something different. You could say a dozen different things to dismiss him in the wake of your embarrassment, and you almost do, but ultimately you don’t. It’s been a lot and you’ve had no choice but to be brave or lose him. So you accept the compliment for what it is.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t ever do it again, though,” and you’re sure he’s only half serious. “Scared the life out of me, girl.”

“You scared me. I was worried sick!” Skin meets skin as you slap your hand on his chest and push. “Maybe if you weren’t getting yourself into trouble all the time.”

He’s as quiet as the desert then, and it hits you that he’s taken your light-hearted barb as something infinitely more serious than first intended. Your hands find his face and you swear you can just the glinting of light in his eyes if you tilt your head just so.

“Not like that, Tai. Honey, no. Don’t… don’t do that.”

“You’re right, though,” he says after a moment. “This is all my fault.”

No no no no no no no, how can he even think that? Is he serious? Everything that’s happened and he’s blaming himself? You start to protest it because how could you possibly continue to let him blame himself for things beyond his control when he shushes you, runs his hands over your shoulders to calm you, a cue to wait. So you do.

The rough edges of his accent have become guttural after this pause, and the evidence of his guilt is there in the way his voice cracks and drops at the end. “I don’t deserve you. Never have. I’ve tried, but I’ll always be a soldier.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should. I’ve killed people.”

The time before the Empire’s rise is hazy at best. The history holos tell one story and those who actually lived say nothing at all, but you have glimpses of memories that don’t match the propaganda you’ve been fed. You know there were Jedi once, a great and powerful race of magicians, but you’d never known much about them before they were wiped out. You know the clones were an army that served at the Jedi’s side, and you know that they helped to quell their rebellion. You don’t understand the politics of it, you weren’t paying that much attention. You were too busy trying to stay afloat in Daiyu’s constant waves of crime and chaos.

You’ve never pressed him for it. What happened in the past is just that – it’s over and done with. You love him for who he is now and for the joy he’s brought to your life. But ever since that night, it’s become more and more obvious that his past still seeps into his present and yours.

You swallow. “I know. It comes with the job. I, I don’t hate you for that, Tai. You know that, right?” He shifts beneath you and you can feel his agitation bubbling up on his tongue, eager to spill out and pin everything on his own shoulders, and you’re not letting that happen. “Stop. I don’t care what you did in the past, it doesn’t define you. I don’t define you by what you were. You’re not a killer to me, you’re not some homeless guy on the streets to me. You’re my person. I’d give up everything for you, okay? I did. And I don’t regret it. If this is anyone’s fault, it’s mine. I shouldn’t have done what I did, I shouldn’t have put my hands on that trooper, but I did. I… I saw them hurt you and, I don’t know, I snapped. We’re here because of me and it kills me every day.”

This wasn’t how you wanted the night to go. You wanted to bask in his presence, bathe in his warmth for a handful of moments before reality came crashing back in and you had to return to Ilo’s front room, to that stupid bar and its stupid patrons. You wanted to pretend for a single second that things were quasi-normal. How foolish you’d been to think that reality wouldn’t force its way back into your little fantasy.

Everything is suddenly too hot. His skin grates on yours, not because of him but because of you. Because you’re ashamed and he’s touching you and he shouldn’t. Fuck. You go swinging up into a sitting position, curling in on yourself as the blanket pools in your lap and his hands falls away.

“I’m sorry,” and it’s little more than a broken sigh. “You work so kriffing hard every day and it breaks my heart. You were tired on Daiyu and you’re more tired here, you’re exhausted, and it’s all my fault!”

One of Tai’s hands lands on your wrist. It burns you up inside. “What are you talking about?”

“This. Don’t you hate me for this? For having to come here?”

“I could never hate you-“

“And I could never hate you!”

Why are you angry? Why is it suddenly rushing over you like a storm, eating you up, charging your body with its electricity? Why is it so damn dark when all you want is to see his beautiful, beautiful face and hold him forever?

“I just hate this. I hate that stupid name I have to go by, I hate that I can’t just be me. I hate that we had to run because of me being an idiot. I hate that we can’t live together on our own, alone. I hate that I can’t touch you because Ilo might hear, or because maybe you’re angry with me, because I disappointed you. I hate that I’m not strong like you and Cody are. And I hate those stormtroopers and I hate the Empire, and I hate what they did to you.”

“Sweetheart,” he starts to chant, a gentle, pleading thing that urges you onto your side again, back in his arms and flush against his chest. He does his best to calm you and you do your best to let him, even though you feel like shit. “This wasn’t your fault.”

You sniffle. “And it wasn’t yours.”

His breath fans out across your face. “Then it isn’t either of ours.”

And you’re okay with that. The guilt still lingers in your belly and you can still feel it tight in his chest, but it’s a step toward self-forgiveness for both of you and that’s enough for now. It has to be. It will be.

He guides you both onto your backs with the blanket pulled up over your shoulders and under your chin. The weight of his hand is gentle on your cheek, a reminder not to let yourself drift too far away, just like the palm of your hand on his sternum does the same to him. You fall asleep like that, alone for the first time in forever and almost content.

The way back to town isn’t nearly as arduous as the way out of it was. This time Tai is being carried on the back of a bantha instead of dragged behind it. This time he has a blaster tucked into his waistband, taken off his love’s hip so you needn’t carry that burden for him; he’ll protect you both. This time the marshal is with them and she’s a remarkable negotiator, so he feels safer, a hair more at ease. It’s a bit like having a CO again. She knows more about these people and this land than he does, she has the tactical and intellectual advantage, but he trusts her and he’ll follow her orders. It’s oddly comforting to fall into that pattern again, and only mildly disconcerting if he allows it to be.

The war is over, he reminds himself, this is different.

And different it is because he never had you around back then. He wonders how his life would have been different, how he would have been different. Not that it changes anything. He’d rather have you now after it’s all over than to have you and potentially lose you back then. Still, it’s curious.

His hand settles at the arm draped around his ribcage and it tightens almost immediately. He smiles. There’s a lot on his mind right now, but it feels so small in comparison to this, to the simplicity of your touch, your cheek on his shoulder. It’s hard to see what’s going on back there, but he swivels his head around anyway and is happy to see you awake. Your eyes flicker to him and dank farrik, he could melt right then and there.

You’re so beautiful.

Perhaps that’s just his heart talking, perhaps he’s incredibly biased, but he doesn’t care. You’re beautiful and you’re his.

“We there yet?” you croak. Your voice has been scratchy since you woke up, likely due to the night air, but he can still pick up on your sarcasm. There you are.

“Getting bored, are you?”

“Mm, bored of the bantha, love, not you.”

“Shame,” he sighs, “I like it. I was thinking I might keep it.”

You snicker and rub your cheek into his shoulder blade. “Oh yeah? We gonna keep it in the bathroom or the kitchen?”

He scratches his chin thoughtfully. “Could share the room with Ilo.”

“Oh Maker, I’d rather live outside than with the two of them.”

Tatooine is not his favorite place in the galaxy, in fact it’s pretty low on the list, but it is in this one moment because it’s where your laughter is. It’s where you are. It’s where your arms wrap around him and your body heat seeps into his skin, miserable though it is at midday, but he’ll never complain about it so long as you’re with him.

The rest of the ride home passes slowly – he’d never really realized just how much sand there was until then – and Tai’s grateful when the party halts at Nej’s dwelling, a structure very similar to the one you, he, and Cody had stayed the night in in Mos Eisley. He slides off first to help you down, but he never lets you stray far; he keeps your hand tight in his. It’s here that Tilelli thanks the Tusken guides that had accompanied them and they amble sluggishly back the way they came.

She flicks the brim of her hat so the entire thing shifts to rests at her hairline. It’s more of her hair than he’s ever seen and even so, it’s just a few dark, wispy strands. “Right then, you two. ‘fore we head down there, I wanna make sure we’re all clear.”

You frown, but nod. Tai inclines his head a bit.

“I’ll explain everythin’ – how we found ya, the deal I struck, you two don’t hafta say a word. Probably be better comin’ from me since y’all are newcomers. Don’t wanna stir the pot much.”

“Thank you.”

Tilelli takes his offered hand and shakes it, smiling. “My pleasure, Tai.”

It doesn’t register with him for a minute because that’s his name, why shouldn’t she call him by it? But then he remembers where he and who he’s supposed to be. And he looks to you when he realizes that she must have heard you say it the previous night. Panic burns down his esophagus as he suddenly starts to spiral. Where can you both go? How quickly will you be able to leave? What if, what if, what if-

“We all got secrets ‘round here. Yours are safe with me.” She tilts the brim of her hat toward the rim of the canyon, just a few paces away from the dwelling’s foundation. “Shall we?”

By the time night falls again some hours later, you’re so tired you can barely keep your eyes open, but you’re determined to stay awake for as long as you can. You have so much work to do. There’s still shattered glass on the floor and all kinds of scuff marks from work boots and metal scraping on stone, and there’s the food that was left out, and that’s not even considering all the things you have to unpack and sort through in the-

“’s late.”

The sudden depth of his voice startles you enough that you nearly drop your broom. You rest one hand on your hip while you catch your breath, one brow quirked up and the other dropping down as you catch a glimpse of Tai passing into the main room.

“I’m just trying to-“

“I know,” he says as his hands come to pluck the broom out of yours. “I know, sweet girl.” It clatters on the edge of the counter when he sets it down very purposefully beyond your reach. “But you need rest.”

You shake your head. “I have work to do.”

“It can wait.” His nose brushes yours as he leans in for a whisper of a kiss, something that pulls you from the duties you’ve assigned yourself and begs you to fall into him. “It’ll be here in the morning. Come to bed.”

You want to dig your heels in and fight him on this, pretend you’re not nearly as tired as you really are. You want to get as much done now as you possibly can so that tomorrow is easier. You want to make a good first impression, you want to show Nej that you’re every bit the hard and capable worker that Tai promised you’d be, and if you don’t get this clean up job done then you’ll fall short of all those expectations. And you can’t do that, you won’t.

“Nej will understand. He’s not like Ilo.”

“But Tai-“

“No,” he rumbles. A shiver runs down your spine when his thumb traces the slope of your nose. “Sleep. If not for yourself, then for me.”

Low blow. You could never deny him anything and certainly not when he asks you like that. Your eyelids flicker for a moment, dipping low as they’re tempted by the sudden idea of sleep, resting beside him, drifting off in his presence. It’s so tempting. So… nice… Maybe if you just lean on him for a second, yes, that’s okay. That’s nice.

You’re vaguely aware of his voice continuing on, but it’s hazy and difficult to understand. All you can understand is his tone, soothing, deep, gentle, everything that he already is to you conveyed in the pitch of his words, whatever they may be.

Sleep. Sleep sounds good. It sounds cozy. It sounds like him. Wherever he is, whatever he’s doing, that’s where you also want to be, so you follow the darkness luring you to sleep and you curl up in the sounds of him until you’re surrounded by it. You don’t dream that night, but you rest better than you have in a very, very long time.

And when you wake in the morning, your skin already warm and covered a thin layer of sweat from the boiling heat of the desert, you find for the first time in a week that you have awakened in Mos Nefta and your lover is still at your side. He hasn’t risen before the sun to shower and hike to the canyon’s surface, he hasn’t left his side of the bed lukewarm-cool and empty. He’s there, asleep, snoring, and with all the little anxieties that usually crease his forehead notably absent. And he’s just barely touching you with his one hand stretched in your direction so his little finger can brush your arm.

Mesh’la. You think it over and over again. You’re not sure what language it is that he never dares to speak, not where it comes from or why he keeps it hidden, but this one word is overflowing with truth. He is beautiful. He’s not perfect in the way that the galaxy says he should be and he’s a man half haunted, but all his imperfections and all the love he gives you, all the love you feel for him, adds up to mesh’la.

He deserves to sleep a little longer, but you’re a selfish woman and you crave him more in this moment than ever before. Your palm finds his cheek as you awkwardly shift above him, trying not to jostle him too much while also trying to get as close as you can. His brow furrows a bit when you tilt his head, likely moments away from stirring, but it’s okay, he’ll understand. You just need to…

“Sweetheart- mmh!”

It’s clear that the kiss takes him by surprise. His limbs go stiff for a moment, then limp, and then finally, his hands are on you, pressing you to him with the slightest pressure, exhaling into your mouth (his morning breath is awful, but he’s cute so you’ll allow it), and sighing so prettily.

“Missed you,” is the murmur left on his lips when you finally pull away. “Love you,” is scattered repeatedly between the following round of pecks across his face. “You’re so handsome, baby. So mesh’la.”

A gargling sort of sound comes sputtering out of him in response, somewhere between a choke and a laugh maybe? “What’s gotten into you?” he hums with a lazy smile.

Ah, yes. You were wondering when he’d notice just how far your hands have wandered. But what’s so wrong with admiring your lover’s body when it’s been so long since the last time either of you felt safe enough or comfortable enough (or alone enough) to do so?

“Getting out of Ilo’s house, for starters.”

He laughs properly this time, all rumbly and gruff with his early morning voice that makes your stomach drop. “That all?” he asks as he curls his fingers around the shell of your ear and down your jaw.

“Is that not enough?”

You suppose there’s more to it than just moving into a proper room, although you feel so much better cocooned into Nej’s only spare room than you ever did in the more sprawling space of Ilo’s front room. At least here there’s a proper bed. And a door. Real privacy. You already feel more like yourself here, but there’s also the fact that despite all the fear and stress of the Tusken’s raid and the hours that Tai was missing, the two of you rediscovered your equilibrium in that tent. Alone in the Dune Sea. Finally able to give the apology you’d been too afraid to voice and to receive his understanding. Finally able to understand that he'd been blaming himself as much as you’d been blaming yourself.

Leaving Daiyu had hurt. Leaving behind your home and everything extra that you’d collected over the years, everything that couldn’t fit into a pack. And nothing about Tatooine has been easy. But he’s here with you and he’s alive, and isn’t that enough?

“Just feel more like myself, I suppose,” you finally explain after a few moments. “And after almost losing you, it’s like I never want to stop touching you. Just to make sure you’re still here with me.”

Tai nods. “I am here. Always. And I’m alright.”

“I know.” One of your hands slips under his sleep shirt and his breath stutters. He tries to play it off and act as though it doesn’t phase him, but you know him and you know his tells. The sudden stillness of his chest, the pulse leaping out from his throat, the crinkle of his brows. “Still. Should probably check everything, make sure you’re in peak condition.”

The smoky chuckle he gives you is so delicious. “Is that right?”

Karking shit, you want him bad. The craving that’s been building up and up in your blood suddenly boils over into desire, hot and sticky and utterly carnal. It thunders through you like a storm, drives your body on instinct rather than conscious thought. You know your way around him better than you know anything else. All you want is to touch him and hear him shudder and make love to him until your body gives out and neither of you can remember your names. So you put your hand around the base of his head and pull him in for another kiss before he can stop you.

Your tongue slips into his mouth and past his teeth, seeking, taking, sucking, tasting every inch of him that he can give. You hope to drown in him, let his essence soak into yours until it's impossible to tell you two apart. And when he moans into your mouth and grips harder at your waist, it only spurs you on even more. You start nipping at his tongue, then retreat and latch onto his lower lip, drawing it between your own as you dig your canines in.

His eyes burn so molten hot that you're almost afraid he'll snap, but truth be told, you wouldn't mind if he did. Tai could bend you over right now and take you, and you'd kriffing beg him for it. Your body has been silently craving his for so long that you're not even sure you'll last once he starts putting his hands inside your clothes.

"Don't. Tease."

"Or what?" Your arms slide up and over his shoulders to trace over the veins in his neck, the thick cords of muscle that are now straining under his skin. "You'll fuck me?"

He shakes his head. "No, sweet girl. I'll make love to you." You open your mouth to fire back some smart retort when he yanks you hard against him by the waist and your mind goes completely blank as limbs slot into place and you find yourself half on top of him, half melting into the mattress. "Build you up and break you down to make up for all the time we lost."

Fuck, you can't breathe. "Promise?"

One of his cheeks dimples when he smirks. "I'm a man of my word."

He always has been. Your loyal soldier, the man who's made his home in the chambers of your heart.

You kiss him again, slower this time, while you snake a hand down his chest, over the swell of his tummy to the hem of his boxers. You’re salivating by the time you retreat from the warmth of his mouth. You need to taste him. It’s never been such a strong need before, not like this, and if you don’t get your mouth on him in the next minute, you’re surely going to explode.

It's at the exact moment that you slip under the fabric and wrap your hand around him, of course, that there’s a knock at the door. You don’t mean to, but your hand tightens on instinct and it’s everything Tai can do not to shout out at how alarmingly good it must feel because you can feel the vibrations of his withheld moan all the way in his gut.

“Yes?” you call. Tai seems otherwise occupied at the moment.

“Suns are up.” It’s Nej. “I was hopin’ Nax’d be able to get to work on the equipment early today.”

A very wicked idea comes to mind. You run your thumb over the head of Tai’s cock just as you reply, “He just woke up, but he’ll be ready in a few minutes.” It’s projected just loud enough that it hopefully muffles the grunt he lets out.

The look he sends your way is absolutely foul. Oh, he looks like he could kill you. Or maybe he looks like he could fuck your brains out. Perhaps that’s why his eyes are glinting so dangerously. You smile as sweetly as you can manage, but it quickly devolves into a smirk. You’re not fooling anyone.

Nej gives his thanks and you can just make out the sound of his crutches as he hobbles back down the hall. Good. The moment he’s out of earshot, you’re going to town on your man. If you live that long, of course, because with the way he’s looking at you, it’s entirely possible he’ll smother you to death. Not a bad way to go so long as it’s between his thighs.

“Minx,” he growls, still quiet enough to not be heard beyond the door but with all the venom and fierce arousal you see in his eyes.

You squeeze him again. “I’ll be quick, mesh’la.”

And the sound he makes must rewrite the chemistry of your brain. “Kriff, don’t- don’t say things like that,” he huffs, head thrown back and eyes squeezed shut.

“Oh, I don’t know.” There’s nothing casual about the way you slowly wet your lips and flicker your eyelids so your lashes flutter. There’s nothing casual about the way you fix him with the exact same “fuck me” eyes you gave him in that bar so long ago. “You look like you’re enjoying it,” and you’re sure to quicken the pace of your strokes as you say it. “Now lay back, old man. Let me wake you up properly.”

He almost certainly has some witty remark on the tip of his tongue, but he keeps it to himself. Or maybe he doesn’t. Maybe that glazed over shine in his eyes really means he’s too far gone to even notice or care that you just called him an old geezer. Maybe he wants you just as badly as you want him, so this little barb doesn’t rile him up like it normally would. Instead, he watches you settle onto your stomach between his thighs, soft and warm and ready, and he lets you take him into the damp heat of your mouth, run your tongue along his length until he's shuddering and sighing. He sounds like the prettiest, sweetest symphony.

Tai settles a hand on the crown of your head. Its weight is firm and heavy, but hesitant. He's probably holding back. Doesn't want to hurt you. No time for that. Nej is waiting and you have a mission to complete – you need to taste him and it needs to be fast. But being fast doesn’t mean you don’t tease. You still run the tip of your tongue along the dip in his head, still take a moment to lick a long, slow strip from his base to the top, and you do make sure that you never look away. Want him to see how deep your desire runs. Want to see him unfold for you.

“C-Can’t. Hold out. Much longer.” Oh, and his teeth are bared, shining in the dim slivers of light coming in through the window shade. “Mesh’la.”

His legs are starting to shake and you manage a smile around his fullness, just for a breath, just long enough for him to see it and moan.

“Fuck, your mouth. Dangerous little thing.”

You hum cheerily in response. Take a deep breath, unlock your jaw as far as you can and lower yourself until you’re taking more than you usually can. Then you swallow.

It all happens so fast. His legs tense up and the tips of his nails dig into your scalp, hold you on him until you’re choking and sputtering just like you wanted to be, and he’s coming and coming and coming. Every noise he makes goes straight to your cunt, floods your senses until the creases of your thighs feel slick and your stomach is twisting. Every jerk of his hips and desperate, breathy whimper that comes out of him is so fucking intoxicating that even though he’s finished and made a complete mess of you, you don’t want to stop. You just need a second to breathe and then-

Then he’s pulling you off, gasping for air as you resettle beside him. There’s something about the way his eyes are going in and out of focus, how his chest is rising and falling so rapidly, how unbelievably sexy he looks all fucked out, Maker, this man is going to be the death of you.

He relays the same sentiment once his breathing has settled.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t like it?”

He makes a big show of rolling his eyes and huffing as if he’s genuinely annoyed, but you know he’s just flustered. Big old softie.

“I think you liked it a little too much,” he murmurs. His nails scratch over the back of your neck as he kisses you, prompting you to mewl softly into his tongue. “Shame I have work to do. Guess I won’t be able to make love to you like I promised.”

“That’s alright,” you start to say. I can wait, you want to say. I had fun teasing you, you almost say. You’ll make it up to me later. But he cuts you off with a swift nibble on your earlobe and all you can get out is a lewd little whine.

There’s a moment between his tongue swirling under your jawbone and his teeth nipping at your neck where your brain blacks out and you swear you can feel him between your legs, but that can’t be right. He has to get ready for work. You’re just not thinking clearly from the arousal and the early hour and, and… And the fingers gliding through your slick are definitely real and he’s definitely trying to distract you from it or rile you up with all the attention lavished on your throat, and now you can’t even think clearly because all there is is him and his fingers and his tongue, and, “Right there, right there, fuck, baby. Tai, Tai-“

And just like that, his fingers are gone and your body is flashing hot and cold in his absence. Hell, he’s already climbing off the bed as if he didn’t just wipe your brain of all cognitive thought with a single touch. “Like I said, my love, I have work to do.”

No, wait. Hang on. This wasn’t supposed to go like this. “But-“

“Shame, really.” He’s already pulled on his trousers and started on his belt. “But duty calls.”

Now he’s just being mean. You crawl out of bed like some long-legged, newborn bug who hasn’t learned to walk just yet. “Tease.”

The dimple in his cheek returns when he smiles at you. “Minx.”

“You’re just gonna leave me like this?” As if you weren’t okay with that just 10 seconds ago. But then he’d touched you and that went screaming out the window.

Tai’s quiet at first. He slips on his undershirt, lips pursed as he thinks. Then he pulls on his work shirt and starts working on the buttons. It’s a dangerous game you’re playing, but he’s the only flame you’ll ever burn yourself with; you reach out and snag one of the buttons, slip it through the loop, and let your fingers linger after. There’s a beat, a breath, then two. The tension in the room is so thick that the air feels humid.

Just as you withdraw, his hands lock around your wrists. His head tilts up and his eyes catch yours. Oh. Your stomach drops to the floor the moment before he crowds you in against the wall. Danger danger danger goes the alert in the back of your head, but it’s him, it’s Tai. The only danger is the possibility of you coming on the spot if he says something dirty enough.

“You’ll work hard today, won’t you?”

Confusion creases your brow. “Yes?”

Something rumbles deep in his chest when he leans in and pins you to the wall. “You’ll be good, cyar’ika?”

You don’t know this word, but you love the way he makes it sound, so you nod eagerly. “Yes, baby, I’ll be good.” Whatever good means.

“And when the suns set.” His breath warms your still damp skin, a chill runs down your spine. “When our work is done, when Nej has gone to sleep and the desert is quiet.” Fuck. Fuck, he’s so close, he’s so riled up, and he’s so, so close, you can feel him everywhere. But you still can’t touch him, not with your hands pinned to the stone. “I’ll make good on my promise.”

"Build you up and break you down to make up for all the time we lost."

Your eyes very nearly roll back into your head. “You, you promise?”

He leaves you with a chaste, tender kiss and a nip at your throat. “Always.” And then he’s gone.

please let me know if you would like to be added to or taken from this list!

#clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #clone veteran reader #daiyu veteran x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper nax x reader #nax x reader #tai #the tai saga #star wars #lmfao this chapter is for the tai girlies AND the tilelli girlies #for my tilelli girlies i am potentially thinking of a cute little oneshot or two of her and a theoretical reader or oc girlfriend👀#anyways. will the next chapter be pure smut and minimal plot? absolutely yes thanks for asking

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imarvelatthestars · 8 months

Text

Persistance

Pairings: Clone Veteran (from Kenobi) Tai x f!Reader

Warnings: none

Notes: I know we're all here for Tai and his sweetheart, but I am highkey crushing on Marshal Tilelli and I want other people to also love her. Just saying 🤷🏻‍♀️

I also borrowed some New Zealand sign language for the Tuskens as a little nod to Tem 💕

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The desert is cold at night, but it’s painful outside the warmth of a few walls and a single blanket. You didn’t think about that before you left. You weren’t thinking at all when you left. Now you’re… well, you’re not sure where you are, you just know that you’re freezing and alone and you’re terrified.

“Get down! Everyone, get down!”

You close your eyes against the memory, but it persists. The marshal’s blaster drawn and her eyes wild, the other townsfolk rushing through the doorway, the youngest member crying inconsolably.

“Ilo, get over here!”

His claws digging into your shoulder as he pushed you down behind the bar, the people squeezing in around you as they hunkered down out of sight.

“Nej is hurt bad,” you’d heard over the sudden thundering of adrenaline and blood in your ears. There was a moment of silence, then, “They took half our farming equipment.”

Nej. The moisture farmer. Tai’s employer.

You remember wanting to shout, wanting to demand his whereabouts, the panic settling in and choking your breath and your very voice out of you.

“Keep ‘em safe. I’m going after ‘em.”

The memory dissipates as quickly as it appeared, which is a blessing. You don’t want to relive the rest. The horror in the pit of your stomach, the bile in your throat. You can’t. You won’t. You don’t have the luxury. If you give it breath, it will overwhelm you and then you’ll lose yourself. You’ll never find him.

And you will find him. The Emperor himself couldn’t stop you.

Everything hurts. His shins are on fire, mostly where he’d sustained his worst injuries on Umbara, but his chest is burning too. The air is sharp and cold, and his civvie wear isn’t enough to keep him protected against the elements, so every breath hurts. His ears are somehow both hot and cold. The top of his head is burnt again and the backs of his hands are cracked from Tatooine’s dry heat. Now they hurt too with the chilly night air. And his feet. He wants to lie down and never get up again. Too many years of charging into battle in shitty boots, too many years of carrying too much gear with him, wearing his joints down until it feels like they’ve turned to dust whenever he moves too much.

And they’re watching him. The children are the most obvious about it – they lounge in their parents’ arms with their eye gear trained on him, following him when he leans one way or the other. Most of the adults don’t seem too interested, but he isn’t fooled by their neutrality. He can feel them watching him when he turns his back and he knows he would be doing the same if the positions were reversed. Their leader doesn’t shy away from his observations, though. Or she. They all look the same to him.

As Tai tilts back his head to observe the stars, Cody’s voice comes to him, warning him of Tatooine’s rural dangers, the creatures that lurked beyond the dunes and the violence they wrought. He remembers the concern creasing your brow and the hesitancy in your eyes. He thinks of you. He hangs his head.

What a fine mess this has all turned out to be. Everything he tries seems to be going wrong these days. The date, your escape from Daiyu, resettling in Mos Nefta. He’s tempted to think he’s cursed because it seems impossible that anyone else could manage to have such poor luck. Perhaps it’s the universe’s way of paying him back for uprooting your life, or for what happened in the Temple…

No. He can’t afford to think like that, he can’t afford to lose his focus. He promised himself and you that he wouldn’t let his mind go there, he wouldn’t allow even a possibility of talking himself out of letting you go. He has to stand by that now more than ever because if there’s one thing that’s going to get him out of this, it’ll be the thought of coming home to you.

One of the massifs huffs and rearranges its sleeping position. The fire crackles. The leader’s gaze rests heavy on his back, so Tai returns to his work. Reinstalling the farming equipment is difficult without Nej’s help and his hands karking hurt, but he has to keep trying. Stay on their good side. And maybe they’ll let him go when it’s all over.

There’s a rocky outcropping just ahead, the one thing within 20 klicks that isn’t stupid fucking sand. Sand never used to bother you, but now it’s pissing you off. It’s shifty and unstable, and every time you trip over yourself, it winds up filling your boots and sticking between your toes. It burns your skin when you brush over it too fast and with too much force, like when you fall and grab pointlessly at a handful. The sooner you get to that outcropping, the sooner you can sit and rethink your next move.

You trudge forward, exhausted. You haven’t exerted yourself like this in years. All you want is to settle back into bed with Tai and sleep for five days. Who cares if it’s in Ilo’s front room? At least it’s vaguely comfortable and sheltered from the elements. At least Tai would be there. But he’s not.

Sand people. That was what the townsfolk were all whispering about. Horrible monsters that hid their skin under layers and layers of cloth, violent things shrouded in mystery. They made awful sounds. They took things when they wanted them without a care for the people they took from. And they’d taken Tai, along with half of the farming equipment he and Nej had spent so much time working on.

What would they do to him? Torture him? Keep him as a slave? Murder him? You have no idea what these beings were capable of, you just know that they’d taken the most precious thing in the universe right out from under you and you were lost without him.

Your hand lands on the nearest piece of rock as you crawl out of the sand and beach yourself. Everything is quiet for a few moments, except for the rapid pounding of your heartbeat. Everything is still.

“Thought I told you t’ stay put.”

Dank fucking farrik, Sith’s hells, what the-! You practically fly out of your skin and nearly go tumbling over the side of the outcropping when the voice hits you. The only thing that stops you is a pair of boots and the person wearing them – Marshal Tilelli.

“Easy there, Miss Starla.”

Your sanity is hanging on by a thread and if you have to hear that fake ass name one more time, you’re going to scream.

“Don’t call me that,” you snap as you roll onto your hands and knees to catch your breath. “You scared the shit out of me.”

She has the audacity to snort at you. “You’re outta your depth out here, city girl. That’s why I told you t’ stay in town.”

“Ilo’ll look after you. You keep everyone calm handin’ out drinks, and I’ll bring your man back fer you.”

You’d frantically shaken your head at her. “You don’t understand, he’s my-…” Your what? Tai’s more than a lover and technically less than a spouse, but… that’s not how it feels in your heart. He’s all of that and more.

The marshal had smiled very kindly at you and rested her hand on your shoulder. “I understand better ‘n you’d think.”

“He needs me.” It was about then that you had started to cry.

“He needs you alive. Which means you’re stayin’ here.”

The logical part of your brain had agreed with her. Unfortunately, the rest of your brain had gone into a panic and taken over. You ran and you didn’t look back. You followed the tracks that the invaders and the marshal had left behind with the singular goal of recovering your love at any cost.

“Where is he?”

Tilelli sighs. She twirls her toothpick from one corner of her mouth to the other and lifts her eyes to the horizon, one leg propped up on the rocks and her forearm braced against her thigh. She looks like something out of a holofilm.

“’bout 2 more klicks.”

Is that all? Bone tired though you are, you surge forward on unsteady legs, ready to march off and recover your man, only to be stopped by a hand on your arm.

“You’re not comin’.”

“Yes, I am.”

She fixes you with a pointed look that doesn’t entirely make you want to back down, but you do pause for a moment. “That blaster,” she says with a nod toward your hip. Tai’s blaster. The one you took out of his pack before you left. “You ever fired it before?”

You’ve shot those toy blasters at the yearly fair, the ones where you can win a prize if you shoot down all the nexus in under a minute, and your aim wasn’t half bad. You punched that stormtrooper back home. You walked all the way here, cold and alone, and you were only half lost. That has to count for something.

But your silence is the only answer you can manage and it’s answer enough for Tilelli. “Respectfully, ma’am, I ain’t riskin’ bringin’ you with me. I’m riskin’ enough comin’ out here on my own. I outta march us both right back into town and leave those parts and your fella with the Tuskens.” And you start to protest, but she holds up a hand. “But I won’t. ‘cause I ain’t heartless.”

You wonder for a moment just what kind of a woman the marshal is, because she’s not like anyone you’ve met before, except for maybe Tai or Cody. Perhaps there was more to her than the charming persona she often fronted with.

She crosses her arms over chest. “Now if I tell you t’ stay here, are you gonna listen? Or am I just wastin’ my breath?”

It’s not that you want to be rude. Because you don’t. You like the marshal best out of everyone in town and it’s clear that they all respect her. And to so bluntly say that you’re planning on disregarding her orders feels a little too harsh to you. But it’s still the truth.

After a few moments of nervous chewing on your lip, you find your voice again. “I’m not turning my back on him, not if he’s so close. I’m not leaving him.”

Tilelli nods as if she were expecting this. “Thought you might say somethin’ like that.” She extends her left arm and wriggles her fingers a bit. “Gimme that blaster. Better make sure you know how t’ use the damn thing.”

“I don’t understand you!”

These creatures make noises the likes of which he’s never before heard. It’s hard to imagine how it could even constitute a language, but it clearly does. Even the children seem to understand what’s being asked of him, even the gestures they make with their hands to accompany their grunting appear to have a meaning, but none of it makes sense to him. He was never trained for this. This was the kind of nonsense General Skywalker or Kenobi would handle. He was built to fight, not to barter peace.

But he also knows that he is massively outnumbered. They have the advantage in every way that counts. The only thing he has is desperation and the element of surprise. Which all adds up to the general outcome of ‘not looking good’.

So he backs down when the leader gets in his face, growling at him for Maker only knows what. He bows his head and raises his hands in surrender. “Alright, alright! I’ll try again.” He points to the equipment sticking awkwardly out of the sand and nods. “Blasted nerf herders.”

What he doesn’t say is how half this kit won’t even work beyond the moisture farm. That Nej would be better at this than he is. He’s out of his depth, working too hard on something he still has too little an understanding of. That he’s so hungry, he feels like he’ll be sick. He’s parched, he’s tired, he’s angry.

He’s a soldier and that means he shouldn’t have been taken by surprise like that, he should’ve been more on guard, more attentive. He should have fought harder. He shouldn’t have let them hurt Nej, shouldn’t have let them land a single blow, but… he did. And now he’s here and he’s afraid because he has no armor, no weapons, no back up. Nothing except his owns hands and his wits, both of which have lost their edge.

He dives into the wiring of the stupid, shitty equipment these beings are desperate to have, blinking back his fatigue, and he thinks again of you. He hopes you’re sleeping. You need as much of it as you can get because you’ve been out of sorts since you first arrived. Working hard and late, taking care of him in the evenings, doing more than he’s ever asked of you, and all for him. He misses you so damn much. It takes him by surprise just how much.

He will make it back to you. Somehow. He’s not sure how, but-

The massifs are suddenly going crazy, growling and grumbling at something in the dark, whatever it is he just can’t make out. The children and their parents all hurry into their tents while the soldiers and their weapons stand on alert. The leader has stepped to the forefront of the camp, just past the fire and with a staff in hand. Its metal tip glistens in the silvery light of the moons and the russet hue of the fire. But still, Tai can see nothing beyond the faint outline of the dunes and the sleeping banthas.

The leader shouts something into the sands and, to Tai’s surprise, something shouts back.

“We come in peace!”

He’s not sure he’s ever been so happy to hear another voice, particularly the drawling voice of the marshal. It’s still too dark for him to see her, but just knowing that she’s there is enough to ease his anxieties.

The leader grunts, probably something along the lines of ‘who the hell are you?’

“You know damn well who. Probably why you waited ‘til after my rounds t’ do your dirty work, eh?”

Some more guttural sounds, this time complex enough that Tai can’t really guess at its translation, accompanied by some gestures.

“Mos Nefta’s never done a thing t’ you and you know it.”

There’s a flash of durasteel in the dark, a glimpse of a broad brimmed hat and dark skin, but there’s something else hiding in the shadows with her. He can’t see what it is, can’t properly see around the creatures and their weapons, but he knows something is there. Maybe she brought someone with her?

“I’ll ask once,” says Tilelli, “and then I won’t ask again, you understand? Return what you stole. You need somethin’? Maybe we can come to an arrangement, but this is not how you get it.”

Tilelli steps further into the light, accompanied by her shadow, and Tai’s breath catches in his throat. What in the galaxy are you doing here? You catch his eye as the firelight shimmers over you and in that moment, nothing else exists. There is only you, there will only ever be you.

“Tai.” Your voice trembles like a leaf in the wind, eyes wet and sad. “Tai!” You start for him, your bodies drawn to one another like magnets, but you’re stopped by the marshal’s hand on your arm as it pulls you back.

The creatures raise their weapons at your advance, start whispering among themselves.

“Wait!” Tilelli shows them her hands and then makes a couple of gestures like the ones he’s seen already, but different, softer: barely curved hands, one pressed atop the other and held to the chest as her body rocks from side to side, followed by a dividing motion. “You understand?”

They look to each other in quiet contemplation, likely determining what they will choose to do, but he doesn’t care. Maker forgive him, he doesn’t give a single shit about anyone else because all he can see is you. He just needs to know you’re okay, that he’s okay, that he can go home with you; that’s all that matters now.

The galaxy holds its breath with him, the air goes completely still, more so than it has been the entire evening, and he waits. And waits. And he sees you struggling, and it breaks his heart.

And then they part – the sand, the dunes, the creatures, all of it splits right down the seam and a path opens up from him to you. He sizes up the situation before he allows himself to give in. Is it safe? Is it genuine? Can he…?

You’re already running to him. Your legs aren’t accustomed to walking in the uncompacted sand and you wobble as you go, but Tai’s certain he’s never seen a more beautiful sight. He takes a breath and he runs. His senses are attuned to everything around him just in case, but it all goes away once you come crashing into his arms. Your arms go flying around his neck and your nose, cold at the tip, nestles into his neck, your face is damp, and he can feel sweat soaking through your clothes at the small of your back.

It’s perfect. You’re perfect. Hot, cold, sweaty, teary-eyed, and frantic, and he’s never loved you more because you came for him. You’re a civilian. He’s pretty sure you’ve never even touched a real weapon before you met him, but you’re here, you tracked him through the desert. And you’re alive and he’s alive, and maybe, it’s just possible, that everything’s going to be okay for once.

“Ner kotir dala.” It unfolds from his tongue on instinct, even though he’s hardly spoken to you in Mando’a beyond a few hesitant utterances. “Thought I’d never see you again, mesh’la.” He takes your face in his hands and rubs his big thumbs across your cheeks. “What are you doing here, hm? What were you thinking? Jare gar oyay par ni, for an old idiot?”

“I thought…” You’re still shaking, except now you’re crying too. “Couldn’t let them hurt you. I love you so much and I-“

The kiss he lands on you is messy. He can’t decide if he should keep his tongue to himself or not, not because he wants to take you in front of all these people, but because he’s so overwhelmed by your love and by his love for you, he can feel it in his very soul. He doesn’t know how to show it the way he’s feeling it. Keep his mouth closed and give you the most tender of kisses to show how deeply he appreciates this risk that you took to get him back, how proud he is of you? Or open you up to him like he’s learned how to do, like he loves to do, remind you that he’s here and he’s alright and he’s going to take care of you once this is all over? It ends up somewhere in between the two.

translations:

the 2 hands held to the chest and rocked - lover(s) (yes, this is NZ sign language!)

ner kotir dala - my brave woman

jare gar oyay par ni - risking your life for me

please let me know if you would like to be added to or taken from this list!

#clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #clone veteran reader #daiyu veteran x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper nax x reader #nax x reader #tai #the tai saga #star wars #scsfakduqohdksoqvd i just have had this chapter in the back of my head for months now and it all came rushing out of me today #3k in less than 12 hours is pretty neat if i do say so myself

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imarvelatthestars · 10 months

Text

For The Heart

Pairings: Tai (Daiyu Veteran) x Reader

Warnings/Content: references to o66 & ptsd; brief mention of past sexual activity but no explicit content in chapter; demiro/demiace Tai is canon to me; cuteness at the end!

Word Count: 3.2k

Notes: I borrowed @littlemissmanga 's matchmaker, Yen, for this one.

part of the clone matchmaking universe by @tcwmatchmakingau

The war is over. That's what everyone keeps saying, but he's not sure how he can believe it. The war is over and the Republic is saved. The Chancellor is dead. A new Chancellor is in office. Tai doesn't even know who it is, he's not sure if he's supposed to care.

The war is over and clones now have rights. No longer are they Kaminoan property, to be poked and prodded at the will of the long necks and their scientific whims. They have legal personhood, pensions, actual medical, psychiatric, and physical care that they don't have to pay for. They're free. They even have legal representation in the senate, a couple of the boys from Windu and Secura's company, apparently. They have political allies, Organa and Chuchi, and he's hearing now that Chuchi's involved with a clone herself.

It's... a lot to take in all at once. But the hardest thing for him to grasp is the fact that it's been three years since the Clone Wars ended. Three years of wandering the deserts of the galaxy, hunting down traces of Jedi, searching for purpose where purpose never really was. Three years after something switched in his head and he stopped feeling human and more like a soldier, like a killing machine. Three years of following his big brother into battle, chasing the rumors of Jedi and Force sensitives, being a good soldier and following orders, until the remnants of Vader's Fist found themselves huddled in a pathetic little pile of hungry, glassy eyed men on Daiyu's dirtiest street corner. He doesn't even know who Vader is.

They put chips in our heads, Fives had said. Made us complacent, made us kill. We'll have to take your chips out, too. Tai wonders if that's why he had nightmares every night for three straight years. Maybe the chip that told him to shoot younglings is the same thing that made him dream of a Sith lord with a bloody saber, made him want to hunt down every Jedi in the galaxy.

But the dreams are gone now. So are the chips. He has an apartment on Conruscant's mid-levels and a job and a monthly pension to make up for his years of unpaid service. He has everything he never thought he could have. And it's strange to wake up and not put on armor every morning, to not choke down GAR regulated grub, to not head for the barracks and work on his target practice, but it's okay. He has free will now and that's... that's okay.

"Did you hear about the Commander?" "Which one?" "I heard he's head over heels. Totally lovesick." "Which one?" "The last eligible one, di'kut!"

He always overhears something strange at the VA's office. The last time he overhead a couple of the younger boys gossiping about Secura and Bly finally having their first kid. Now they're going on about some kind of -

"-matchmaker, but I dunno. If they can find someone for Appo, they can find someone for anyone."

That makes his ears perk up. There's at least fifty different O'Niners and Niners and Alphas in the whole GAR, but as far as he knows, there's only one Appo. He tries not to sound or look too interested, buries his nose a little further into his pad and pretend that he's found some highly fascinating article that he simply cannot look away from.

"Saw him and his beau out at Monument Plaza the other day. I don't think I've ever seen him smile before."

Tai's not sure he's ever seen it either and they were batchmates, were kriff's sake. Not that that apparently means much to either of them now. He hasn't heard from his vod in months. He'd just assumed the PTSD was hitting him hard again and maybe that's true, but it seems there's a little more to it than that. A boy, maybe, or not a boy. Someone. Not that it matters. His vod is finally happy.

One of the boys - and boys they must be because they look like shinies, they can't have seen much of the war - starts going on about some of the other 501st troopers and Tai shifts a bit in his seat. It's really weird to hear other clones talk about his legion when he's sitting right there, but he supposes that's his own fault to a degree. He never went and got a tattoo, never dyed his hair obnoxious colors or got any piercings, he never felt the need. His first and only duty was to the Republic and his men. He knew he was a clone and he made peace with it, no need to try and set himself apart when he knew in his heart that he was his own man. Now, though, he feels out of place without anything to outwardly determine himself by. Clones are noticed now. They're allowed into high end establishments and welcomed into every class and sector. Now he's another face out of millions and no one can tell him apart and it actually matters.

He really hopes it isn't obvious when he starts typing in 'coruscant clone matchmaker' on his pad. He hopes it's not obvious that he spends the rest of his wait time thinking about the results on his pad, that he thinks about it during the meeting and after it, on his way home, during dinner. He hopes no one can tell that he might want this, whatever this is.

The tab with his holo search results stays up on his pad for a solid week. It haunts him. It's there when he goes to bed, when he wakes up, lurking in the back of his head during his shift. If Appo could meet someone, Appo the stern, silent, far removed commander, Appo with the stick up his ass, then couldn't he meet someone too? He wonders what that would be like.

All the holoroms he's heard of or seen show generic Coruscanti couples in their generic upper-level homes, living generic lives and having a generic romance. That's not what he wants. He wants the things he's heard whispers of over the years. What Bly and Secura have, what Appo has - someone who loves him not as a brother, but as something more. He wants to know he means something to someone, that he's worth something. He wants to know if there's something more to life than eating, sleeping, working, and jerking off when he's bored.

The matchmaker's been skimming his application for the last minute and he's about ready to crawl out of his skin. This was stupid, he tells himself. I'm three years too late. What am I doing here?

"You can relax, you know," she says with a sly glance from the corner of her spectacles. "I'm just reviewing your information before we start chatting."

He nods, but it doesn't stop his fingers from trembling. He tries rubbing them into his thighs, but that doesn't do anything, so he settles for crossing his arms instead. All the extra anxious energy goes flooding into his legs and his knee starts bouncing without him even realizing.

"There's nothing for you to be anxious about, trooper. You have an excellent profile. Steady job, your own place, and good references from your brothers."

"Thank you, ma'am."

She taps her nametag with a very sweet and patient smile. "Yen, please."

"Right." He really needs to settle down. He feels so jittery that it's making his stomach hurt and he doesn't even fully understand why! "I've never done this before."

Yen nods at him. "Many of your brothers were in the same position when we started this place. It's nothing I haven't seen or dealt with before. In fact, it'll probably work to your advantage."

Oh? Tai's not sure why - don't people want someone experienced?

"Not necessarily," she says once he voices his confusion. "Especially with some of our ladies and gender non-conforming folks, they prefer partners that are more down to planet than, say... Fives."

He actually barks out a laugh, it takes him so by surprise, and the tension that's been weighing down the room lessens considerably. "No chance of that, ma'am. Closest I ever got to Fives' level was when a civvie got dared to kiss me on a round of spin the bottle."

This seems to catch the matchmaker's attention because she leans back in her chair and quirks an eyebrow. "Tell me?" but it doesn't come out judgmental or like she's going to laugh at him. He's not sure he feels comfortable enough to share, but he still gets the feeling she's being genuine in her interest.

"Eh, not much to tell. It was early in the war."

"Did you like it, the kiss?"

The memory is so far back, it's difficult to recall. But he does remember the taste of liquor on her lips and the heat of her skin. She was sticky. It wasn't the best kiss, it wasn't the worst, but it was his first. His first trip to 79's. Maker, it seems like eons ago. He was another man back then, still a shiny.

"I don't mean to make you uncomfortable, Tai, I'm sorry. I'm simply trying to gauge where you're at."

Tai shakes his head. "No, uh, it's alright, ma'am. Yen." He scratches at the patch of scruff that's growing in along his chin and pretends to read one of the pamphlets on her desk so he can gather his thoughts. "Truth be told, I never did much of the stuff my brothers got up to. I tried at first, but it wasn't for me."

"Why's that?"

He's not sure where his answer comes from, but it comes out of him all the same and he knows it's the truth. "Never felt right. Never felt close to any of the civvies I met. They were all there for a good time, but I wanted something different than that." He sighs. "That and I was too busy being a soldier to be a man."

The room goes quiet save for the soft ticking of Yen's chrono, somewhere on the wall behind him. He has flashes of strobe lights on the dancefloor and a girl in a sparkly dress with her hands down his trousers, he remembers she was pretty and flirty and she made his dick hard, but after they got each other off in the storeroom, he still felt sort of empty. He doesn't want that to be what happens this time.

"Are you sure this is what you want, Tai?"

Yen is a striking woman. She's very beautiful in a normal sort of way and very professional, he can tell she's smart and capable, but there's a softness to her that takes him by surprise when he properly looks her in the eyes. She cares.

"I want... someone," he finds himself saying. "I want to try again. Not for the- the sex, if you'll excuse me." After all, she is a lady. He won't be crass.

She smiles again. "For the heart?"

That's a romantic way to put it, he supposes, but she's a matchmaker. Sure. For the heart.

You have Yen's last message on constant repeat in your head and when it's not repeating, you're logging back into the app to reread it so you can starting repeating it again. You're so fidgety right now that you can hardly sit still, the backs of your ears are sweating, and your chest is all tight and pitter-pattery. You've been on plenty of dates thanks to Yen and the matchmaking service, this is nothing new, but none of them have really panned out and you're so eager for this one to work.

First there was Boil (you weren't a big fan of the moustache/beard situation he had going on, but he was nice), then there was this tall, lanky clone who hardly looked like a clone at all (Crosshair, you think his name was) and he was a sourpuss the whole evening. There were others, some were outgoing and bubbly, some were grouchy or reserved, a few seemed more interested in drinks and where the night might lead you rather then the actual date you were on, and it wasn't that you weren't trying or you didn't like them, but you just couldn't find that spark. You weren't clicking with any of them. After a while you sort of gave up; most enrolled clones had found their partners after a year and the incoming trickle of younger clones were a bit too young for you. You just figured you'd missed your chance and that was that.

Now you're at a nice Pantoran restaurant. They've been increasingly popular among clones after Senator Chuchi's fight for the CRP act and they tend to be just classy enough that you don't feel weird about having a single drink and you don't feel forced to drink more than that. You're waiting for your date and you're hoping he shows, wondering if maybe he won't and brainstorming holo options for if you go home early.

He's a slower kind of guy, doesn't want to move fast. And very respectful. You'll like him.

You hope you do. You hope he's as nice as Yen says. You hope he doesn't mind that weird mole of yours or the color and cut of your clothes or that you've already eaten all the breadsticks.

Somewhere in the front half of the building, you hear the door chime go off and your heart skips a beat. It could be him! He might be at the service desk right now! Or - your pessimistic side rears its head - it could be some happily married couple. They'll probably sit in the booth next to you and canoodle all night. Great.

Your head dips as you take a sip of your ice water and your mind starts to wander. There's a new holoshow that's airing right now and you've been thinking of starting it, you could queue it up when you get home and - boots. There are boots by your table. Two pairs of boots, actually. One of them is all shiny and polished and distinctly Pantoran made, but the other... they're work boots. There's no way. Is he really here?

"Pardon me, miss, your date is here."

Oh. The boots lead to legs lead to broad hips and a broader chest, then a neck, a neatly trimmed beard, a face. Oh no. He's handsome. They're all handsome, of course, but he's different somehow. Your entire face flushes with heat.

Your date swallows audibly, he flashes you a tired smile, and he bows his head just slightly. "Ma'am."

Oh no. Something about the timbre of his voice and the implied respect behind that one simple word has your heart about to beat right out of your chest.

"Hi." It's somewhere between an exhale and a squeak. Maker, this is already getting embarrassing. Get it together! "I mean, hi, uh, it's good to meet you."

You start to clamber out of your chair and offer him your hand, and you realize you're trembling again. But he's a gentleman, just like Yen said. He doesn't squeeze you too hard, doesn't shake you too vigorously, he applies just enough pressure for you to remember that he's there.

"Likewise. I hope I'm not too late?"

"No, no, I got here early. You're fine." His eyes dart to the empty bread bin and you immediately duck your head in embarrassment. "Maybe a little too early, I might've gotten hungry."

His laugh isn't fully realized, it's a little bit reserved, but there's genuine humor in his eyes and you notice they crease a bit at the edges. Cute.

"That's alright," he assures you in that rumbly voice of his. You don't remember clones having such deep voices, but you're not complaining. You're so not complaining. "Won't see me turning down a warm meal."

"Me neither."

This is where it gets tricky. Small talk is always awkward, first dates are always awkward, trying to figure out how you and a stranger mesh is always going to be awkward, there's just no way around it, but damn do you hate it. You're so sick of trying to chat about the weather (it's Coruscant, the weather's artificial) or politics (everyone's glad Palpatine's gone, it's old news now) or whatever obscure sports fad has taken over the clone community lately.

Your date - shit, what's his name again? - is browsing the menu when you speak up. His eyes shift over the top of the flimsi. "Look, I'm not really good at the whole small talk thing. I never know what to say and sometimes I can't tell if the other person is bored of me or not, so I just wanted to say that I'm genuinely happy you're here, I'm just a little awkward at first. I hope that's okay?"

Tai! That's right, you remember because Yen made a note that it rhymes with sky and not gray. Something changes in Tai's face then that you can't explain. His eyes, dark and brown like fresh kaf and cinnamon, can't find a spot to settle, but they seem drawn to yours. The little wrinkle above his brows smooths out after a moment and you see his shoulders relax a hair. There's something weary about him that peeks out behind the neatly pressed dress slacks and the scars on his knuckles, it weighs on him.

"May I speak freely?"

He sounds so unsure of himself, like he knows he's speaking too formally but doesn't know how else to verbalize it. But you encourage him to continue. You smile. You want him to be himself.

"I'm not very good at all this." He gestures to the menu, the bread bin, you. "Didn't get much dating in before the war and didn't get much in after it either. I'll probably stick my foot in my mouth."

"That's okay, Tai." You pause for a moment when his breath catches, you hope that was okay, hopefully you said it right, but his gentle nod gives you the confidence you need to continue. "I'll probably do the same. I'm under the terrible impression that I'm funny."

The corner of his mouth curls into a vague approximation of a smile. "Hm. Unfortunate."

"You're telling me! You're only my second date to actually look somewhat amused by that."

Tai seems to be considering his next words. You can see him start chewing on the inside of his mouth as he scratches along his jaw. It's a nice jaw, from what little of it you can see. His beard looks nice, very dark and recently combed and if there's a little whisper of gray by his chin that makes your head feel dizzy, that's no one's business but your own.

"I must be one of the only people under the impression of a sense of humor then."

You like him. He has good vibes, as you've heard the younglings say. He's trying and you're trying too, and that's all that really matters.

tai taglist: @moodymisty @rain-on-kamino @dystopicjumpsuit @temple-elder @wanderer-six @jambolska-grozdova @bambambunny @andrakass2 @bobaprint

#daiyu veteran x reader #clone veteran x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #kenobi clone trooper x reader #tcw matchmaking au #clone matchmaking au #daiyu veteran x you #clone trooper veteran #clone trooper tai x you #clone trooper tai #tai #daiyu veteran #star wars #lmaoooooo sorry for the boil + crosshair slander it's all in good fun #and yes! there will be a part 2!

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imarvelatthestars · 10 months

Text

Cautiousness

Pairings: Clone Trooper Veteran (from Kenobi) x f!Reader

Warnings: some light angst, shorter than usual

Notes: I messed around with canon to expand on Tatooine a bit, hope y'all don't mind. This is also one of my entries for the Clone x Reader bingo, but more on that at the very end! (If you're new here, I have links at the bottom.)

[previous chapter] [next chapter]

There's a moment between sleeping and waking where everything is hazy - you don't fully recall the previous day or think about why your legs ache so much, and you don't put much thought into the heat steadily seeping into the room. You blink and drift in and out of consciousness, listening to the shuffling of feet and the rustling of clothes. Tai must be getting ready for work. You want to kiss him goodbye before he goes.

"Wait," you mumble as you turn onto your other side, arm stretched out across the mattress.

And then it hits you. Because he is getting dressed, yes, but he's not in his work gear and you're not in your room. You don't even recognize this place. And it's too hot for an early Daiyu morning.

The troopers, Cody, Tatooine, it all comes flooding back and you sit up with a gasp, burying your face in your hands.

The bed dips and you feel the heat of Tai's body beside yours. He doesn't say anything, doesn't need to, you're sure he knows what you're thinking. His hand is a comforting weight upon your knee and the repetitive motion of his thumb rubbing over the joint serves to ground you in the present. It's more than you thought he'd be willing to give.

"We're leaving soon," he whispers. His voice is still scratchy from sleep, all rumbly and low in his chest, and normally that might make your heart skip a beat, but right now it only makes you feel worse. "You should get dressed."

You expect him to leave, but instead he stays. He waits for you. He leans in after a moment and presses a kiss to your temple, then nudges your hair with his nose. Dank farrik, he's going to make you cry if he doesn't stop.

"Tai?" You feel so small and pitiful. You feel dwarfed by the enormity of the galaxy, by the weight of your actions, by everything that's led you here, even as he shifts closer. "Are we gonna be okay?"

You don't doubt him. You know he's brave and strong and smart, he's resourceful and now he's not alone, he'll come out of this just fine, you're sure of it. You don't doubt the love you have for him, nor necessarily his love for you, but your guilt encourages you to doubt yourself. Ever since you've known him, you've been keeping him safe. It hasn't always been conscious, but the intent has been there behind every little action, every credit spared, every kiss and touch, every night you've sacrificed sleep to chase his demons away. You didn't keep him safe last night. You tried, Maker, you tried so hard. Now you just feel like a poor excuse for a partner.

It's his silence that drives you to speak again, terrified that he's mulling over all the ways in which you've disappointed him. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen."

But before he can say whatever it is weighing on his tongue, there's a knock at the door and a voice that should belong to him but doesn't. "Two minutes, vod."

One more kiss to your temple and then he's up, buckling his belt and finishing the laces on his boots. "C'mon, love," he huffs as he struggles with the knot. "Time to go."

You still feel like you're half asleep, bogged down by your sorrow and disappointment though you are. You feel like you're watching a holo. Surely this isn't your life, waking up in a strange bed beside a soldier, on the run like a criminal? This isn't you. This isn't right.

"Tai-"

"Here." He practically throws your shoes at you. "Quickly."

You're stumbling out of the room what feels like a mere blink later. Your laces are sloppily tied and your entire body feels grungy with sand and sweat and the icky feeling of sleeping in your day clothes, but you don't even have time to tell Cody "good morning" before he and Tai are rushing you outside. Dank farrik, what's the big rush? The suns aren't even cresting above the horizon yet!

Cody nods at his fellow soldier. "Ten minutes."

Tai echoes this with a hand at your back, just below your shoulder blades, and then the two of you are off in about the opposite direction of the rising suns. He sets a brisk pace, your veteran, and you can see it better now through fresh eyes and with a hint of sunlight just how easily he fits into this role of a trooper on a mission. Yours is simple - make it to the edge of town where Cody will meet up with you with transportation. Then it's off to Mos Espa.

"What happens after Mos Espa?"

Tai shrugs, eyes forward. "Cody says there are settlements on the far side of the planet, places no one'd ever think to look for us. But we need the spaceport. Traveling across planet by speeder, it's too dangerous."

So that's it, then. You're stuck on this hunk of rock. You suppose it could be worse, you could be stuck here without Tai, or you could be captured by the Empire, or, arguably the worst option, locked up in a containment cell on Daiyu. But your pack is already digging into your shoulders and the air is starting to heat up and you still have this desperate, stupid urge to burst into tears.

You glance at him from the corner of your eye. Rigid posture, determined eyes, and he's moving so kriffing fast. You'd think he'd be winded by now considering he's not a young man anymore, but he bears his pack and the pace extraordinarily well. Under different circumstances, you'd probably be begging him to take you home so you could better appreciate his stamina, but right now all you can think of is the burning shame in your gut because you are struggling.

The sand has been traipsed on enough in town that it's become compacted and even, but the further out you go the more difficult it is to walk properly. The ground continues to slide out from under you and your legs are stiff, which really doesn't help. You feel small and useless. And ridiculous. Meanwhile, Tai hasn't made a single grunt of discomfort this entire time.

The rest of the day follows in much the same way - you cling to whatever parts of Tai you can reach around his pack from your spot on the back of the speeder bike, follow Cody the hour long drive to Mos Espa and ditch your bikes behind an old building, you rub sand out of your eyes and the ache out of your butt, and you trudge along behind them feeling entirely like a little kid.

"What is this?"

Cody's just returned from a brief meeting with a contact. He hands over a pair of chain codes before stealing a quick look around. Always wary, cautious. It's starting to rub off you too, has started as a prickle at the base of your neck and a heaviness between your lungs when you start getting a little paranoid.

"New identities," he replies. "They'll get you safely past any Imperial checkpoints."

It's like you've been dunked underwater. Now you're changing your entire identity? What more could possibly need to be done to outrun the Empire? You look to Tai, to Cody, then down at the chain code burning a hole in your hand, and your eyes start watering.

Fucking dammit, this isn't the time to cry and you know it, but this isn't what you signed up for! None of this is. Daiyu wasn't your favorite place in the galaxy, it was shitty and you hated it, but you'd never anticipated leaving. You never thought you'd wind up on Tatooine, of all places, this sandy, sweltering dustbin that makes you feel itchy and sticky and seems to suck the very moisture out of your body. You thought that perhaps if you were very, very lucky and you worked very, very hard, you could live out your days in a semi-decent part of Daiyu with the man you loved by your side. And you never would have asked for anything more.

The code display light clicks on at your touch and flashes several strings of aurebesh - Tausi Starla, aged exactly one year younger than you currently are, born on Bespin to the Starla family, previously employed by a respectable business until she became the owner of a plot of land in the uncharted Tatooine regions. Your new identity.

You catch a brief glimpse of Tai's chain code and spot a new name, some vague details about his birth date on Kamino and his forced retirement from the Empire's service before he shuts it off. He nods at Cody as he stuffs the code into his pocket.

"Thank you, sir."

The pair clasp forearms for a long, solemn moment before Cody breaks into the slightest of smiles and pulls Tai into a proper embrace. You watch for a heartbeat or two until you feel a bit too intrusive and glance away. A few words in a tongue you can't understand are shared, another nod, and a brief press of foreheads, and then the commander turns to you.

"Ma'am."

You swallow the lump in your throat. "Is this where we part ways, Commander?"

He hums, arms folded low across his torso. It catches you off guard; Tai does that sometimes. "Yes," he nods, "but I'll be in contact once you're settled." Then he pauses for a moment and you can tell he's thinking seriously and deeply about something very important by how his expression shifts. "You couldn't be in better hands, ma'am. He's a 501st lad. Some of the bravest men I served beside came out of his legion."

It's not even remotely subtle, but it is terribly endearing. And bittersweet. He doesn't have to sell you on Tai, on his bravery or his honor or goodness, you've seen it all firsthand, but the fact that he's trying to help means more to you than you can say.

"Thank you, Cody." Something in your gut tells you that it'll be a while before you see him again, this goodbye might even be permanent. It's a big galaxy and the Empire is everywhere. So you pull the commander into a hug and squeeze with all your might. You try not to dwell on how familiar yet altogether uncanny his frame feels beneath yours. "For everything. Thank you so much."

It's nowhere near perfect, none of this is, but you're only here, alive, because of him. You'll never forget this man for as long as you live.

Cody smiles when you both finally part. His irises are big and brown and melancholy. "Take care of yourself, vod'ika," he says with all the fondness a soldier like him never ought to have.

Tai starts beside you. Something unspoken passes between them, sharp as the sand and sunlight in your eyes but gentle, too, like the soft glow of the moons at night, something not meant for you but undeniably centered around you. You can feel this understanding rattle in your bones. It's big, whatever it is, but the time for it has already passed. Tai nods, salutes his commander, his brother, his friend, and Cody returns the gesture, and then he's gone.

"What did he say?" you ask.

The knot in Tai's throat bobs. His attention remains fixed on the corner of a nearby building where the commander had disappeared, almost like he can't quite look at you. He can touch you, though. He wraps an arm around your shoulders. Maker, he feels like home. And he noses at your temple, presses his mouth along your hairline, croaks in a low, warbling tone that betrays the tears you can't see in his eyes. "Mando'a. He called you 'little sister' in Mando'a."

You don't fully understand why he didn't just say it in Basic and you get the sense that there's more meaning behind it than what it literally translates as, but it still strikes you hard enough to knock the air from your lungs. Family. Cody called you family.

"C'mon," says your love as he withdraws his arm. "Let's get to that transport."

prompt: tatooine ✔️

if you're new to this story, you can visit the series masterlist here and read about Tai and his sweetheart's journey!

@clonexreaderbingo

taglist: @moodymisty @rain-on-kamino @dystopicjumpsuit @temple-elder @wanderer-six @jambolska-grozdova

#clone trooper x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #clone veteran x you #clone veteran x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper veteran #kenobi clone trooper #clone trooper tai #tai #star wars #the tai saga #daiyu veteran #daiyu veteran x reader #daiyu veteran x you #okay now with all the tags out of the way - yikes #i promise the next chapter will be longer and more interesting! but it felt weird to add anything else after cody's farewell #so we'll be seeing what happens next in the following chapter. which luckily for y'all is about half done #cfb2023

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imarvelatthestars · 8 months

Text

Transience

Pairings: Clone Veteran (from Kenobi) x f!Reader

Warnings: some references to sex, but nothing explicit

Notes: some more expansion & world building in Tatooine! I had fun creating new characters & tossing in a few nods to North African/Tamazigh culture, which is where George Lucas got most of his inspiration for Tatooine. (If you want to know about all the hidden easter eggs, I'm happy to share.)

For anyone just joining the series - this is my take on Nax, started before he received a canon name. You can start the story here.

[previous chapter] [next chapter]

The transport is small and crammed with junk. It smells. There’s a rather irritable Rodian sitting on your right who won’t stop grumbling under her breath and it doesn’t escape your notice that she has a holster tied to her hip. You’ve noticed a lot of people have blasters out here. Tai has one now, too. You’re not sure how to feel about it; he knows how to handle it, you trust him to be safe with it, but you kind of hate the idea of him having to use it.

It’s one more item to add to the list you’ve written in the back of your head, which currently consists of:

• sand people? jawas? avoid them??

• jabba the hutt – mos espa. keeps slaves. definitely avoid.

• find a new job. what kind of jobs? does tatooine have janitors?

• practice blaster-ing

You fade in and out of sleep during the trip, though you’re not sure that Tai ever even closes his eyes. He remains a firm, steady statue beside you, always alert and watching and quiet. He’s impossibly quiet. If he wasn’t pressed up against your body from knee to shoulder, you wouldn’t even know he was there. You wonder if that’s something he was trained for, and that leads into a deeper spiraling train of thought.

He’s a soldier. There was never any doubt, but you can’t ignore it now. It comes with complications. Being a soldier is not inherently bad. It requires discipline and endurance and a kind of inner strength only some people can ever dream of. It also requires loss and death and blood. You know he’s killed before. It’s never felt so real as it does in the hull of this shitty transport.

Tatooine is a lawless place, full of slavers and pirates and gangsters. Cody had warned the both of you about the indigenous people here, how you couldn’t trust them, that it was best to avoid them at all costs, and to never wander the desert alone. An old veteran with a blaster might just blend in here. He could carve out a life for himself among the sand dunes and wind-whipped mountains. Then you think about how much you were struggling walking the length of Mos Eisley and you want to crawl into a hole for the next thousand years.

What are you doing here? There’s no way you’ll be able to make it out here. Tatooine is a hundred times worse than Daiyu and here you no longer have the advantage of understanding the territory or culture. You don’t even own a single weapon. You’ve never needed one. What if the heat cooks you? What if you get horribly sunburnt? What if you can’t find a job or a place to stay and you end up wandering the desert until you die? What if you get caught by raiders? Slavers?

The Rodian grunts and grumbles into her communicator, and you come back to yourself. To anyone else, it might look like you simply jolted awake. Tai seems to think so, since he rubs his hand over your knee but doesn’t offer anything in the way of conversation. It’s a hint of normalcy. Your heartbeat evens out a bit.

There are a few things you know for sure: you’re resilient, you’re afraid, you have credits and chain codes, Tai will keep you safe. Even if he’s distant, even if he never looks at you again, you know he’ll keep you safe. That’s all he’s ever done.

The transport thunders and shrieks before finally tripping to a halt. The speakers crackle a bit as an equally crackly voice announces, “Last stop. Get out before I throw ya out!”

Charming.

Mos Nefta. It's a small stretch of a town along the base of a canyon, and by town, you mean about 16 people. They come in every shade of human you've ever seen. They're polite, but it's a restrained nicety that barely veils their obvious distrust of newcomers. The landscape of the town makes up for it, though. Buildings are carved into the cliffside with steps leading down to the canyon floor, some 15 feet below where the barest whisper of a river trickles. A few stubby palms and some tiny flora have sprouted there, the only hint of natural green you've seen on the entire planet so far.

It takes some bartering of credits and a bit of Tai's quick, clever thinking, but he manages to score a place for you both to stay with the local cantina owner until a more suitable arrangement comes around. A bit more of his fast thinking lands you a job as something between a waitress, a bartender, and a dishwasher, while he gets a good word put in for himself with the town's head moisture farmer. Neither is easy.

Being a cantina girl is so much more than serving drinks and taking orders. It’s cleaning puke off the counter (courtesy of the local drunk), getting heckled by large, intimidating, scary men that look at you like they’re starving and you’re the freshest meat around, it's your boss telling you to work harder and faster and sweeter, remember to smile so they tip well, flirt just enough so they want to come back and spend more credits, and, of course, it’s hot.

Everything is hot and painfully dry except for when it’s wet from your sweat. Then it’s somehow worse. You can’t wash the scent of your own body odor out of your clothes, clothes that were made for the cool, biting Daiyu climate. Sometimes the heat drops during the night and you’re granted a reprieve from all the sweat and strange dreams that the weather seems to be inducing, but most of the time you’re just miserable in a different way.

Tai isn’t faring any better, although you suspect his paycheck doesn’t rely on his ability to flirt or be flirted with. He works long hours that leave him sweatier and smellier than you. His hands are often sore from time spent repairing droids and moisture vaporators, and what little time the two of you have alone at the end of each day is spent rubbing lotion into his palms and bacta on his sunburns. He’s tired, plain and simple. You see it wearing on him more and more every day.

You don’t bring up Daiyu. Or Cody. Or how guilty you feel. He doesn’t bring it up either. It simmers low in your belly, festers more and more each day until you’re sure one day it’ll come careening out of you, but for now it settles.

“I got another big tip today.”

Tai doesn’t respond beyond a rumbling hum. His eyes have been drooping shut for the last five minutes.

“I’ve been saving everything I get. I think we might be able to get our own place soon if I take on extra shifts.” You’re already working the majority of the day, he knows this. “And… I still have that jewelry box from my grandmother. Ilo says the Jawas buy and trade for all kinds of things. I could get us some proper clothes.” His latest sunburn catches your eye and it deepens one of the dozens of tiny cracks in your heart. You run a finger over his cheekbone, soft as you can manage, and sigh. “Get you a hat so you stop burning out there.”

It's then that he finally peeks through his eyelids. “Mm mm,” he grumbles with a frown. “That box is yours, sweetheart. You keep it.” He leans forward to rest his forehead on your shoulder, but you can feel when his frown shifts into a smile. “’sides, I don’t need a hat. Got you.”

His hands drift to yours, fingers curling loosely around your wrists. He’s smearing some of the leftover bacta over your skin, but it’s so cool, it feels wonderful against the warmth of the late evening. You don’t mind. You enjoy it. In fact it feels like it’s been ages since you’ve touched one another, since you’ve really let yourself savor his presence because every day has been so busy and exhausting. You’ve been so preoccupied with merely surviving.

“You should sleep, hun,” you whisper into the stubble of his hair.

He nods half-heartedly, but doesn’t attempt a response and fuck, if it doesn’t make your heart about beat out of your chest. You’re caught between feeling so in love and overwhelmingly guilty because his body is so, so weary and it’s only so the two of you can build a life out here.

You swallow thickly. “You’re already falling asleep. C'mon, baby. Lie down with me.”

You won’t be able to go to sleep just yet, your mind is still whirring, but he needs this. Kriff, you need this too. Need to feel him beside you like he always was back on Daiyu. So you lay back in the makeshift bed in Ilo's front room, drag him with you so his head is resting on your breast, you keep your arms around him, and you let him drift into sleep. His snores are still soft and light as he flickers between this world and the one in his dreams.

“I love you.” It’s whispered to the dead silence of the room and there is no response, as you expected, but that’s okay. Maybe the words will seep into his dreams. Maybe it’ll make all of this worth it.

The cantina’s barely been open an hour when the marshal comes striding in, toothpick poking out one side of her mouth. Her spurs jingle as she approaches the bar, leans forward so her forearms are resting on the counter and the brim of her hat is tilted in your direction.

“Mornin’, Miss Starla,” she drawls.

After a solid 8 rotations, the name is starting to feel at least somewhat familiar. You smile. “Morning, Marshal.”

"What you got fer me?”

“Whatever you’d like, Marshal.”

Marshal Tilelli is a Mirialan, tall and lithe and dark haired. Her eyes are a warm hazel and her skin is purple with the traditional diamond shaped tattoos of her people, and she tends to wear a shawl over her hair when she’s not peeking out from beneath the broad brim of her herder’s hat.

She hums after a moment of consideration. “It’s a bit early fer spotchka, ain’t it?”

“Maybe,” you shrug, “but I won’t tell anyone.”

“That’s fine, Miss Starla. I’ll have me a Sarsi, if you don’t mind.”

Her spurs jingle again as she moves to take a seat at one of the barstools. This time the hat comes off and you get a quick look at the plait she’s pinned atop her head before ducking your own to focus on making her drink. It’s an easy fill job, no liquor to fuss over, but you make a point of sticking a cute little umbrella in the top in the hopes of brightening her day. Someone around here ought to be in a good mood and if it can’t be you, you’d like to at least make sure it’s someone else.

“Ilo around?” she queries as you pass her drink over.

“Not yet. He was still in bed when Ta- uhh, when, uh, Nax and I left this morning.”

Kriff, you very nearly let it slip that time. Tai had been so adamant about you being careful with your new names. It wasn’t likely that anyone out here had heard about a couple of fugitives from Daiyu, but you needed to be aware of the possibility and cautious with the information you shared.

Tilelli doesn’t seem to have noticed your slip. She’s more focused on her drink and whatever is currently on her mind. She does seem to like the umbrella, though. “Let ‘im know I was lookin’ fer ‘im, will you? And thanks fer the decoration.”

She leaves with a nod of her hat and saunters back outside, temporarily allowing a sliver of sunlight to filter in through the open doorway. You catch a glimpse of red and brown and golden-orange before the door comes hissing shut. A reminder of where you are, of the reality that you can no longer escape.

It’s funny, though, because despite how massively stressed you feel over this move and your new identities, despite how much you don’t like sleeping in a stranger’s living room, despite the fact that the heat is borderline unbearable, the thing you feel most keenly is Tai’s absence. You’ve been missing him since you fell asleep last night, since you woke up to an empty bed. You miss his shorter hours on Daiyu and the energy you both used to have. You miss your apartment and the life you’d built there. You miss the way things used to be. You miss it every day.

You miss his kisses, the whisper of his lips and tongue on your skin. You miss the way he used to touch you, you long for the exact way he used to nuzzle into your neck and breathe his hot exhalations into the space beneath your ear while he sought out the parts of your body that made you arch into him. You miss his intimacy and playful flirtations. But all of that feels fleeting now, transient. Absent.

You’ve both been absent lately. Dead on your feet. Something needs to change and soon, or you’re going to lose your mind.

Something goes clattering in the back of the kitchen, starting you out of your musings. Ilo must have decided to finally drag his ass out of bed. The Besalisk comes lumbering into the bar with a yawn and a mildly unimpressed expression. He’s asking about your chores, making sure you haven’t been lounging about and doing nothing the whole morning. Like he has any room to talk. Like he’s not fully taking advantage of your circumstances.

Yes, something around here definitely needs to change. For Tai's sake, and for yours.

please let me know if you'd like to be added to or removed from the list

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imarvelatthestars · 1 year

Text

Conscience

Pairings: Clone Trooper Veteran (from Kenobi) x f!Reader

Warnings: Tai's struggling with extreme self-hatred, some PTSD, survivor's guilt, etc.

Notes: Just a few more chapters left in the series! (Although knowing me, I might add more.) I'm so thankful to everyone who's stuck around through my absences. Tai's story means so much to me and I'm honored to share it with you all.

[previous chapter] [next chapter]

He thinks he's going to be sick. They're on a transport, they're hurtling farther and farther away from Daiyu every second, but Tai can't help the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach.

It wasn't supposed to go like this. He'd finally found something worth fighting for, someone worth living for, and of course he's gone and screwed it up. He just had to go out with you, had to show you off for all the galaxy to see as if he didn't have the most recognizable face in the entire blasted universe. He had to go out of his way to be a fucking idiot and now where's it gotten him, you?

You're huddled together in the cargo hold of a transport that's seen better days and smelled better ones, too. Everything important the pair of you owns is on your backs and when he finally looks at you, really looks at you where you're burrowed into his side, he sees that you're shivering.

"Hey." His arm moves around your shoulders unconsciously. Instinct. It's the first time he's properly touched you since Cody smuggled the pair of you in here. He's felt too tainted to even try.

"I'm okay," you whisper as your eyes dart up, heavy-lidded and bloodshot. "Just a little cold."

Tai swallows. This is all his fault. He doesn't even know what he's doing right now. You shouldn't be here. You should be back in bed, snuggled under the covers and snoring, and maybe, maybe if you're feeling gracious enough, merciful enough, you might let him curl his arms around you and find shelter in your warmth for the night. As if he fucking deserves that. He doesn't deserve bantha shit. He almost got you killed today.

"You have anything warm in your pack?" he asks, and the voice that comes out of him sounds like a stranger's.

You gesture to the knitted sweater you're currently wearing. "This is all I have." You sound surprisingly chipper, like you're not even bothered by your current predicament, like you're commenting on the weather or- "Hey. You okay?"

The horrible nauseous feeling falters for a moment as Tai realizes you're watching him. He clears his throat, sits up a little straighter, and musters up as much of a smile as he can. "Yeah. I'm alright, s-... I'm alright." He wanted to call you sweetheart, but the word tastes bitter in his mouth. He's tainted it, like he's done to everything else he touches.

"No, you're not."

You've always had this uncanny ability of seeing through him and catching onto the shattered pieces of him he leaves lying around, picking up his trail until it leads you back to him. It was stupid to think you wouldn't pick up on it this time.

"It's fine."

Your entire face drops into a frown. "Tai."

He spots Cody out of the corner of his eye and has to bite his tongue to keep from snapping at you. Not in front of the Commander. Maker, this is the worst he's felt in months, maybe even years. It's one thing to be harassed, he's been harassed by those damn TKs since the Empire came to power, it's nothing new, but it's another thing entirely to be harassed and embarrassed in front of you. Treated like the cannon fodder he's always been and for you to see it. And then for the Commander to have to smuggle him out of there, to realize that Tai's always been a coward in hiding, desperately clawing out a home for himself in the leftovers the galaxy has thrown at him. To see him holed up in a shitty apartment with a civvie. It goes against everything that the GAR trained them to be.

It's just another reminder that he's a failure.

When you press him again, he takes a moment, takes a deep breath before looking you head on. Properly. Finally. "Not now. Please."

There's something in your eyes he can't place. He's seen you scared before, confused, angry, disappointed, but this is different. It's simultaneously all of them and none at the same time. You seem to swallow your own thoughts before speaking again. "I'm here for you. You know that."

He nods. Of course he knows. He's never been more grateful for anything in his entire life.

"Don't shut me out." He bristles a bit when you reach for his hand and he can see how much it hurts you. It's carved into your face in an instant. "Please don't."

The transport shudders around you both and Tai looks to Cody. It's not a conscious thought, but it's burned into his very soul to defer to his commanding officer. Cody grunts as he pushes himself to stand, checking the chrono on his arm and pursing his lips as he thinks.

"Looks like we're arriving a bit early."

"Think it means anything, sir?" He tries not to think about the strange look you fix him with.

Cody huffs. He rests a hand on his blaster. "Guess we'll find out."

Tatooine is a fucking wasteland. You've never heard or known much about it, other than it being under the control of the Hutts and a breeding ground for spice runners and addicts. That and the slavery. But you hadn't been expecting sand.

There's so much of it. Everywhere you look, sand. Yellow and burning hot and rough on your skin. It's already blowing into your eyes within 10 paces of exiting the transport. The heat is even worse. You first caught a glimpse of two suns before Cody lead you out of the docking bay and your view of the sky was cut off. No wonder it's kriffing hot.

Now you're walking the streets, blending in amongst travelers and tradespeople and speeders. You've only ever seen pictures of banthas before. You never realized they were so humongous. And there are less humanoids here than you're used to on Daiyu. Droids, Jawas, and a dozen other species you can't even name are meandering in and out of cantinas, marketplaces, hopping in and out of speeders.

It's a lot. All of this is a lot. Just a few hours ago, you and Tai were out on a date. You were planning on a romantic night in after dinner, maybe even calling off work just to steal an extra few moments with him. Now you're a fugitive. Your face was plastered all over the city before you left. Yours and Tai's.

He's been off all night. Day now, technically. Not that you blame him, of course, because he did get harassed and assaulted by stormtroopers. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that he's upset about it and you wouldn't be surprised if it had triggered some of his trauma from the war. You want to help him, remind him that everything's gonna be okay (even though you're not entirely sure it will be), but he's distant. Shying away from your touch, avoiding your eyes, barely speaking a word to you unless necessary.

Does he blame you?

Your entire body goes cold, double suns be damned. Of course he does. If you hadn't punched that trooper, none of this would have happened.

"In here," Cody gruffs and it snaps you out of your head, "quick."

It's a house of some kind. You've never seen anything quite like it, not on your home planet and certainly not on Daiyu. The roof is domed and the walls are thick, made out of some kind of plaster maybe or brick, but the interior is cool. The house looks empty with hardly any signs of life beyond the barest of furnishings.

Cody's planted himself by the door, one hand on his blaster and the other braced on the wall. He's practically bursting with soldier energy, the kind you've only ever seen glimpses of in Tai. You're seeing a lot more of it now. You see it in the ridge of his shoulders, the light behind his eyes, not quite right, not quite him, the firm set of his jaw. You've never seen him so alert before. You've also never seen him hold a weapon, but the borrowed blaster Cody gave him lends him a certain aura that's hard to figure out.

"I don't think we were followed," Cody says a few minutes later and you finally feel like you can breathe. He untucks the flap of his poncho so that it covers his blaster again, then steps a little further into the house. "We'll stay here tonight, make for Mos Espa tomorrow morning."

Tai nods and moves to the dining table where he shucks off his pack and his coat. His movements are quick and precise. He falls into the role of a soldier easily. He doesn't look at you and he doesn't ask questions.

But you have a lot of questions. You have so many questions that your brain hurts.

"What's in Mos Espa?"

Cody looks at you from under his lashes. He looks so much like Tai that it's uncanny, he even moves with that same soldier gait, but he doesn't look at you like Tai does. You look at him and you see a stranger. "Another spaceport. It's too dangerous to leave from this one, they'll be looking for us there."

"Wait." Your head starts spinning. "We're leaving again?"

He shakes his head. "Not quite. Tatooine's remote, off the grid, the Empire isn't too focused on this place, but on the off chance that they followed us here, it's best to keep moving so they can't find us." His focus shifts to Tai then. They start talking logistics, strategies, transportation and timing, but it's all white noise to you.

You flitter in and out of total awareness as your body begins to move on autopilot. You're sweating, so you take off your sweater. Best to fold it so it doesn't get wrinkled. You're thirsty, so you meander in the direction of the kitchen, start poking around for glasses and a faucet. While you're in here, you might as well see what food there is. You're not hungry at the moment and you're not even sure if you can stomach food right now, but you and the two soldiers in the other room will need something soon to keep up your strength.

Right, the two soldiers. The two strangers you're holed up with. The man you love and the man who wears his face, shares his body and voice. You've always known that Tai's a clone, after all he wears clone armor, he's a clone wars veteran, but it never really occurred to you just what being a clone meant. Now you're faced with the reality of it.

Tai's still Tai, but Cody looks so much like him. If you close your eyes, their voices blend together until you can't tell them apart. They're the same height, tall and broad and a little thick in the middle, but you've always liked that about your weary old veteran. The same dusting of black and gray hair on their arms, probably the same on Cody's chest as it is on Tai's. Cody keeps his face clean shaven, though, doesn't even let a hint of stubble grow in. His hair is longer and is nicely groomed, but you can see some tighter coils poking through the gel. Kind of like Tai's hair before he cut it.

The biggest difference is, ironically enough, their faces. Cody has a massive scar on one side of his face. You wonder how he got it. The only facial scars Tai has are the one on his chin - from a blast during his first battle - and another on his neck where he nicked himself shaving. But they both have the same heaviness in their eyes. You recognize it from late nights soothing trauma-induced nightmares.

"Hey."

You aren't sure which of them is speaking to you at first. You're not sure you like it. But you hum in response and turn to acknowledge him.

"You alright?"

A scruffy goatee and weary eyes. You know this clone. You think you do, you hope you do.

It takes you a minute to respond. Your mind feels far away. "Mm. Yeah, I'm okay."

Tai lifts a brow and it's the most familiar thing you've seen him do in forever. "You look tired, my love."

Something warm curls around your heart, gentle and strong enough to encourage a prickling along your waterline. You didn't realize until now just how much you missed him, how much you missed the two of you. You look up into those big brown eyes, a shade lighter than kaf and a shade darker than the earthen floor of this little house, and you immediately have to look away when yours start watering.

"I am," you mumble.

"Go get some sleep. You've had a long day."

What about you? you want to ask. Won't you come to bed with me? But you know deep in your gut that he won't go with you. He's punishing himself. He's an idiot to think you can't see through him, but you won't push him on it, not in front of Cody, not right now. You're honestly too mentally exhausted to even try.

You still cry when you tuck yourself into the tiny cot at the back of the house. There's a couple doors between you and the men, and you're quiet, so they won't hear you. All you know for sure is that you're more lost than you've ever been and you're terrified you're losing him, too.

"There's not too many of us left now."

Tai runs his palm across his face. "I thought I might be the last one." It hurts to say it out loud, to finally vocalize this fear that's been eating away at him for Maker knows how long.

The Commander makes a face akin to a smile, but there's no humor behind it. "Not yet, you're not. The Empire couldn't get rid of all of us."

No, but they certainly tried. It's an unspoken understanding that hangs in the air for a while. Tai suddenly wishes he had a glass of spotchka. He wishes a lot of things.

"So." Cody shifts forward in his seat so his elbows are resting on his knees, chin in against his hands. "How'd you meet her?"

Dammit. This is the kind of questioning he was really hoping to avoid. There's nothing for Cody to find but shame and disappointment. He could try to lie, of course, and he considers it for a moment, but he's always been shit at lying. A lot of the boys in the 501st were shit liars. Now he's the last of them and he fucking wishes he wasn't.

"It's a long story," he tries.

"We have all night." Cody smiles a bit more genuinely this time, but it drifts soon after when he senses his brother's discomfort. "You don't have to tell me, vod. But she's... she's nice."

You are. And he hangs his head in shame because look at what he's done to you.

"She's the best thing that's ever happened to me." It comes out unbidden, but he doesn't regret saying it. "Took me in when I had nothing." For a moment, he's back on Daiyu, gazing up at you, awed, confused, mortified because you took pity on him, saw him through all the filth and neon-lit spice fog. "I sure paid her back for it, didn't I?" he scoffs.

The wind howls outside, tossing sand against the walls of this new little hovel on another backwater planet, and Cody watches him for a moment in the dimly lit dining room.

"What happened out there, vod?"

Fuck, what didn't happen?

Tai's entire throat constricts when he finally finds the words. "I failed. I failed her, Commander, just like I failed our vode, like I failed Rex." He squeezes his eyes shut against the tears that are suddenly threatening to wash him away. He can't quite breathe. His fist smacks hard into his thigh as he twists his face away. "And now I've put her in danger. We were supposed to protect civilians, we were supposed to protect the Republic, and I can't do either."

Good soldiers follow orders. He jolts out of his chair, shaking. When will it stop, that voice in his head? When will it stop haunting him? Master Skywalker. No. There are too many of them. When will he be free of the nightmares? What are we going to do? And the padawan still falls at Skywalker's hands, and Tai is still covered in blood, and he's still a failure.

He starts when Cody rests a hand on his shoulder. He wants to fight it, he wants to hit something, he wants to scream and cry and beg for death because he knows he deserves nothing less. He betrayed the Jedi and to this day he still doesn't know why. He put you in danger, almost let those TKs get their hands on you, almost let you get shot, and still you gave up everything for him.

Cody holds him and Tai cries, and nothing is right anymore.

"We all have to live with the choices we made, the things we did during the war, and after it. But we were good men. We still are."

A question starts to burn in the back of his esophagus, bitter and painful as bile. "Did you kill them, too?"

The silence he's met with solidifies a lot of things for him - he's not alone in his shame or his grief, if the great Commander Cody fell to the nightmares and the whispers, then perhaps there was never any hope for a trooper like him, he has to let you go. That one stings the most because he's only just found you. He's never known love like this in all his life, never fathomed a kindness like yours before. You gave him hope when there was nothing left to hope for. He knows it's the right thing to do, though. You'll never be safe with him around.

Killer. Murderer.

There's something inside him that isn't quite right. It came out last night when the TKs rounded on you, cornered you, promised to show you a 'good time'. He saw red, felt his blood boil, felt the entire universe melt away until it was just his fist and the back of that trooper's head and he was going to smash it in for even daring to look your way, to try and scare you into submission. It was there that night you saw his nightmares for the first time, when he swore you were drenched in Jedi blood and he wanted to crush your head in his hands just to prove how utterly unlovable he was.

"Can you get her somewhere safe?"

Cody blinks at him. A sliver of eternity passes before he seems to understand. "Vod..."

"I can't stay with her." Memories start flashing across his mind's eye, unbidden and beautiful - the first time he called you sweetheart, he thinks it was the night he told you about his job, the night out at that bar and the kiss it wrought the next day, the first time he told you he loved you, the first time he touched you, the mug you bought him for late night teas and early morning kafs. "She deserves better, better than an old man like me can give her."

"Does she know that?"

Tai actually laughs. "She'd slap me for saying it. But it's true. I'll only get her killed in the end."

"Maybe," Cody muses. "Maybe you're not thinking clearly." He doesn't seem bothered by the flashing in his brother's eyes when they round on him. "Not all of us were as lucky as you, vod. Not all of us found someone willing to walk through the fire with us."

The wind howls again in the moments between Cody's wisdom and Tai's panic.

"For our brothers who lost the fight, the brothers that never found what you did." A hand rests over Tai's heart. "Don't push her away."

It's funny, really, how the littlest, simplest thing can change one's mind, how a single object can be the difference between one destiny and another.

He shucks your pack and his over his shoulders and shuffles as quietly as he can into the back room. You're snoring and sleeping pretty heavily by the sound of it, so you hopefully wont be disturbed when he slides in beside you.

He's still undecided about you, although Cody's advice is rattling around in his brain. He'll have to decide before you wake up. But then your pack tips over as he's taking off his boots and something goes clank inside. He frowns, leans down to pick it up, and just misses catching the metallic object half-wrapped in one of your blouses before it smacks on the floor.

Your breathing hitches, Tai swears his heart almost stops, and then you settle back into a steady rhythm. He unwraps the blouse. And there's his mug, the one you saw in a street vendor's shop. It's plain metal, all shiny and silver, but it's shaped vaguely like a lothcat. The handle has a pattern etched into it reminiscent of the ones many tookas sport on their tails.

"It reminded me of you," you'd explained. "Because a lothcat always seemed to have my tongue when we first started talking." Then you'd pecked him on the cheek and bowed your head all flustered and shy.

He's a fool. A damn fool. And he's still got one boot on when he twists and throws his arm over you, drags you into him so he can bury his face in your neck. You wake up fully this time and start squirming under him.

"Wha...? Mnh, Tai?" Your voice is drowsy and rough.

"I love you," he grunts against your skin. He's absolutely crying now. "I love you, sweetheart." He can't keep his hands off you, can't stop kissing every inch of you that he can reach. He has to commit you to memory so that the next time he gets an idiotic idea in his head, he can conjure up this moment and smack the stupid out of himself. "My sweet, wonderful, beautiful girl." Each word is punctuated with a wet kiss.

You have no clue what's going on and you're probably more asleep than awake, but he doesn't care. He'll shower you in love again the moment you wake up. He's never letting you out of his sight again, never letting himself doubt you, never getting stuck inside his own head ever again.

taglist: @moodymisty @arandomnerdsblog578 @jambolska-grozdova @curly-funk

#clone trooper x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #clone veteran x reader #keobi clone trooper #clone veteran #clone trooper tai #star wars #i struggled a bit with cody's characterization bc i don't write for him so i hope he came out in character #anyways uhhhhh i think i wrote this in like 4 hours? i just. could not stop thinking about them and this chapter #i know i said there would only be a few more chapters but honestly i don't know if i can say goodbye to them in like 3 chapters #this might end up being a legit full-on series #i have more plans for them so stay tuned!!

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imarvelatthestars · 1 year

Text

Loveliness

Pairings: Clone Trooper Tai (from Kenobi) x f!Reader

Warnings: sex. That's right, beloveds, this is the chapter where they finally fuck! Porn with feelings, grinding, nipple play, fingering, finger sucking, love bites, hickies, unprotected p in v (bad form, I know), multiple orgasms, light hair pulling, squirting, a good mix of cute sex & sexy sex

Notes: I really just needed an excuse to use this gif. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Also, I accidentally posted it mid-edit, had to private to finish it, then public it, it was a whole fiasco. Apologies for any confusion!

@moodymisty - come get your Tai juice ;)

[previous chapter] [next chapter]

It's been two weeks; two amazing, beautiful, wonderful weeks. Tai has somehow managed to lift the doom and gloom of this miserable old planet just by being himself, by simply existing around you. From the moment you first kissed him, it's been one continuous high of giddy laughter and lazy afternoon snuggles turned into hot, heady make out sessions that turn your brain to mush.

It's been bliss, he's been bliss, and you wouldn't change any of it. But you want more. That's just the problem, though. You want all of him and you can tell he wants all of you, but you're a right pair, the two of you, and you're at an impasse because you're both too nervous to go much further.

The memory of two evenings ago is still fresh in your mind, even now on your way home from work. His broad chest under your splayed hands, your legs draped over his thighs where you'd straddled him, his scruff scratching pleasantly over your skin as you'd pressed kisses to chin, his neck, the lobe of his ear. The way he'd run his hands up the length of your spine, half dragging your shirt up with it, grunting softly into your hair, Maker, it was making you wet just thinking about it.

But then he'd bucked up into the apex of your thighs and you'd practically collapsed onto him, moaning so loudly that it took you both by surprise.

"Fuck, Tai," you breathed against his shoulder.

He'd gone still under you. You could still feel the vague shape of him hard on the inside of your thigh and ghosting against your warmth, and it sent a thrill through your entire body. Half drunk on pleasure, you dropped your hips just so and ground yourself into him. It was all you could think about, chasing after his body, after the arousal that was building so steadily in your stomach that you felt sure it would swallow you whole. You just wanted him and nothing else, just-

Tai's hands on your hips, firmly guiding you to stop moving, drew you from your reverie. Something was wrong, you immediately sensed it in the way his entire body had turned stiff. You drew back enough to look him in the eyes and frowned.

"What is it?"

He shook his head. Entirely unhelpful. So you watched him for a moment, studied the crease in his brow and the purse of his lips, noted the rising and falling of his chest and the pulse leaping out at his throat. He was still firm and warm under your thighs, but he'd shifted his groin away from you at some point.

Something awful began growing in your stomach in place of your arousal. Why was he pulling away? Had you touched or kissed him somewhere he hadn't wanted? Was he overwhelmed, maybe? Your chest felt like it was about to split open as an ugly monster reared its head in the back of your mind. Was he suddenly repulsed by you, by some part of your body?

Your throat threatened to close up on you. "Tai?" you whispered. "Talk to me."

"I just need a moment."

"Did I do something?"

His gaze was on you in an instant as a hand came up to cup your chin. "No. No, my love." There was that smile you loved so dearly, peeking out at the corners of his mouth. "It's me. There's too much going on in this old head of mine."

You wanted to press for more, maybe just enough to clarify that the problem wasn't you, that he wasn't stuck in his head thinking about how much he didn't want to touch you, but you were worried how the question might come across and you didn't want to bother him more than he already seemed to be. Maybe it was silly to feel so startlingly insecure, you reasoned, but Tai had never reacted to you like that before. You didn't understand it.

And so the two of you had settled for cuddling instead, his arm around your shoulders while you lounged for the last hour before he headed out for work.

Now, though, you're bordering on becoming a nervous wreck. You can see your apartment building through the neon haze of the street and it sends your heart leaping into your throat. Because he'll be there when you open the door. He'll most likely greet you with a kiss, ask you about work, and you'll spend some time together on the sofa before he's gone again. And then you'll go to bed alone, miserable, confused, and just a bit unsatisfied. You already did that last night, you're not keen to try it again today. Which means you'll have to have a discussion.

٠ ¤ ٠ ¤ ٠ ¤ ٠

He can't keep this going for much longer and he knows it, but neither can he quiet that voice that haunts him every time he touches you. The voice that tells him he's a lecherous old creep, a fool too old and too used up to be good enough for you, that tells him he's nothing more than cannon fodder, than a pair of bloodstained hands too red to ever deserve to touch you. That kriffing voice that makes him want to crawl into a hole and hide until you finally come to your senses and leave him.

But then he thinks about the first time you ever spoke to him. You were so stupidly nervous that you'd said nearly all the wrong things, but through his damaged pride and your embarrassment he'd managed to catch a glimpse of something, something that made you different from every other civvy who'd thrown credits his way. You'd been kind to him, been a friend when he had no one, offered up your home and then your heart. And now that things are progressing, you've offered him the rest of you.

Dank farrik, he's not sure he's ever wanted someone the way he wants you. Not a one of the cute civvies he met at 79's ever captivated him the way you do now. He wants to treat you right, romance you, lay you back on your bed and bury himself in you forever. Anywhere, any way you want him, for however long you desire. He just- fucking hells, he needs help getting there. He needs to get out of his own head.

The keypad at the entry chimes and his back goes ramrod straight. He runs a hand over his freshly buzzed head and sighs. He needs to talk to you.

There's a glassy look to your eyes. Tai's not sure if you're about to cry or not, but you look anxious at the very least. And you're not meeting his gaze properly, shifting about as you toe off your shoes and set your things down on the table.

"Hi." Your voice is timid, uncertain.

He nods. "Hi." Normally this is where he'd shuffle over and give you a shy, awkward kiss. But he can't find the courage to do that now, not with his stomach full of flutter-bys and his mouth full of cotton. "Good day at work?"

You head into the kitchen. "Long day." And he can tell that your voice is strained. "Might just go to bed early."

No, that's exactly what he doesn't want. He can't stand another night of this horrible tension and he doesn't want another night of fighting his desire to touch you the way you need. So he summons all of his GAR training, all the bravery and strength he once had on the battlefield, and he forces himself to stand. He can almost feel the ghost of his bucket under his arm, as if he's about to give a briefing. But you're not a soldier. You're you. His stance softens a bit.

"Can we talk?"

Your eyes are wide with panic. Shit, he's kriffing this up already?

"Sure," you nod with the worst attempt at a smile he's ever seen. "What's up?"

He can picture it now, the way Rex would be looking at him with that one raised eyebrow. Spit it out, trooper, he imagines he'd say. Fives would probably be laughing his ass off.

"I'm sorry. About the other night." It's easier to get the words out if he doesn't look at you head on, but it makes his heart beat double time. "It's difficult for me sometimes." Even as he's saying it, he knows it's coming out wrong and he wants to smack himself upside the head for it. He feels like a shiny all over again. "Not because of you. I get lost inside my head. I'm a soldier, born and bred, and my hands are covered in more blood than I'd care to admit. It doesn't feel right to touch you."

And while he does breathe a sigh of relief at finally admitting it out loud, it doesn't make him feel much better. Because now you know. Maybe you even agree with him. Maybe this is it.

The floor creaks as you shift in place. "I won't break, you know. If you touch me?"

Tai huffs a rough, humorless laugh and the truth stumbles out of him before he can take it back. "Like you'd want an old geezer like me to touch you."

Your tongue clicks disapprovingly. "Do you seriously still think you're some creepy old guy?" And there's some of that spark that was missing when you first came in. "I'd kick you out if I wanted to. If I was uncomfortable. For fuck's sake, Tai, I want you! I thought that was obvious!"

It was, he was just too drenched in his own pity to really see it. He knows he's a fool. He remembers how perfectly you fit against him that night in the bar, he remembers every breath and moan and aching sigh you've given him since your first kiss. He knows you want him for some unimaginable reason he'll never be able to grasp. And he knows that he wants you too.

He's across the room before he realizes he's even taken a step. He crowds you into the counter, one hand on the lip by your hip and the other boldly seeking out the curve of your waist. It goes straight to his pride (and straight to his groin) when he sees the way your jaw goes slack and your eyes go unfocused, all flustered by his proximity. He likes it when you do that. He likes that you like it. He likes that just being near you makes his mouth water.

Your breath stutters and fans out across his face as he dips his head down to yours. "Forgive me?" he asks.

You nod as if in a daze, tongue darting across your lips. "Yeah."

He claims your mouth tongue first, searing his heat across its seam until you part for him and he tumbles in with something guttural in his throat. Stars above, you're always so warm. Even if he never went further than this with you, he'd still crave your kisses like a man starved. He'd still take your face in his hands and prompt you to open up for him, still dive into the welcoming warmth of your tongue and your breath until there was nothing left in his lungs.

"I was worried," you gasp when he pulls away for a moment. You're looking up at him with wide, lust-blown eyes, but there's something vulnerable underneath it all. "I thought I'd done something wrong, or maybe you didn't want me anymore, I-."

His forehead falls against yours. "No. I want you." He traces a hand up your arm and can't help smirking when you shiver. "The things I want to do to you, girl. You'd run me off planet."

Your entire body shakes. Your eyes flutter shut and he feels your thighs shift against his as they press together. Oh, you liked that, didn't you?

"Shall I show you?"

٠ ¤ ٠ ¤ ٠ ¤ ٠

The path from the kitchen to your bed is a blur of clothes and bruising kisses. Tai's hands are everywhere, seeking out your skin and setting your whole body aflame in the process. Then his shirt is on the floor - yours is somewhere in the hallway with his pants, you think - and his hand is skimming the hem of your bottoms, and your head is spinning with desire. You need this man so desperately that it hurts.

You're still a little nervous, though. You shouldn't be. It's just Tai, after all. You trust him. You love him. It's still terrifying, still nerve wracking to expose yourself like this.

"Hey." Your hand presses into his chest to slow his descent to your collarbone and he immediately stops, eyes wide and flashing, waiting. You smile to reassure him. "I'm okay, we're okay, okay? I just. It's been a while."

His head bobs in understanding. "It's been a long time for me, too." Then his eyes dance away and you catch a glimmer of shame in the downward slant of his shoulders. "I'm not a young man anymore."

You know what he means. You feel similarly about your own body, it's not quite what you want it to be. "That's okay. I like you as you are."

Tai's nose rubs gingerly over yours. "Funny, was gonna say the same about you."

One of his large hands brushes over the upper swell of your stomach where his fingertips brush the bottom of your binder. You can feel yourself clench around nothing at this one simple touch. Already, he's breaking you down into a whimpering mess and he's not even properly touched any of your erogenous spots.

"This alright?"

Your response is the arching of your chest into his waiting hand. He grins and then your binder is rolled up. Your nipple is bare to him for a single second before he takes it between his fingers and rubs. Softly, reverently. And then he takes it into his mouth and you're done for.

One of your knees gives out as your brain short circuits, so you throw an arm around his neck to keep from collapsing. It just brings you further into his mouth and Maker, the sound of his tongue lapping at your skin, the smack of saliva - you're not sure if you'll last very long at this rate. He suckles, bites down just hard enough to make you jump, then laves his tongue over the bite before finally pulling back with a pop!

He doesn't say anything, but he's more smug than you've ever seen him. There's a flame burning in his eyes that threatens to burn you up and you've never been so willing to walk through fire. Whatever he wants, however he wants you. You'd sell your soul for him to touch you like this every waking moment of the rest of your life.

"Nngh, Tai." He's moved to your other breast, but kept a hand at the first one to continue tracing the shape of your areola. "Baby, just like that."

You've never called him that before. You can see the way his forehead wrinkles in surprise as he peeks up at you, your nipple still caught between his teeth. You're both frozen, assessing each other, hesitantly curious, until-

"Say that again," he rumbles.

A hand settles quick between your thighs and starts seeking out your clit, and for a long moment, your entire existence is blacked out by sheer pleasure. You shriek, head thrown back, and tremble into him.

"Baby...," you whine. You don't even recognize your voice. Surely that needy, pitched up mewl isn't you? "Please."

The pair of your drop unceremoniously onto the mattress with Tai's body caging you in. He's so big, he's everywhere, taking up every corner of your vision, his warmth spread out across the entire length of you. And then he's inside your clothes, pulling at them, yanking them off you while you try as best as your arousal muddled brain can to assist him. It's all a fog for a moment as you both struggle with your underwear, until suddenly they're gone and his bare skin is on yours and it's pure euphoria.

Your legs part for him on instinct and wrap around his waist. He fits in the empty space of you just right. His fingers are slipping down to the base of your opening to gather your slick and he teases your entrance for a moment, just enough to make you start to clench around the idea of him, before swiftly moving up and the moment he touches your clit is like entering another reality. Electricity jolts up your spine so you're arching into him, your mouth falls open, and the sound you attempt to make is so wrecked that it only comes out as a half-choked inhalation.

Tai shifts so his other arm is braced by your shoulder. "You sound incredible."

White hot fire spreads across your belly and the tension between your thighs starts to wind up. He thinks you sound good? He likes hearing you? You have to close your eyes to keep them from rolling back. Fuck. Fucking fuck.

You reach up for the back of his neck and press a sloppy kiss to his lips. "Wanna... wanna hear you too," you pant as he circles your clit. He's taking his time. "Bet you sound so sexy. When you're... you're fucking me."

Tai's head drops into your neck and his fingers falter, just for the briefest of seconds, before suddenly flicking twice as fast. Something akin to a yelp drags itself out of you as your orgasm suddenly starts barreling toward you like a freight transport.

"How d'you want me to fuck you?" and his voice is all gravel. The depths of his accent are somehow deeper now, rougher.

You wrap yourself around him as your body starts tightening, winding up more and more. You're so close, you can feel the explosion about to burst somewhere deep in your belly.

Your brain's so keyed up that you have no filter anymore, you say the first thing you can think of, and it's brutally honest. "However you want." The tension's about to snap. "However. Take what you want, Tai, I don't care, I don't care, please, 'msoclose-."

His finger curls across your clit just right, at just the right angle, and you shatter in his arms, mouth frozen in a silent scream as your orgasm rips its way through you. He just keeps moving, keeps caressing your clit through each wave like it's what he was born to do, keeps rumbling low in his chest as you keen and rock into him.

"How many of those are you gonna give me?" His mouth is right at your ear, his breath hot on your neck, and then he sucks on your earlobe and you can't even breathe.

It takes you a second to find the words, let alone remember how to speak them. "As many as you want."

He slips two of his fingers inside you with enough ease that it only takes him a few thrusts before he can add a third. Without the direct stimulation on your clit, this is manageable, it's not too much, which is truly a blessing in disguise because you want to feel the whole of his length inside you before you tap out. You want him to fuck himself into you until you can't tell where starts and you end. You can't do that if he wears you out too fast, so this casual pace, the thickness of his fingers stretching you open for him, it's just about right.

"Want all of you," you murmur against his open mouth. The bulk of his shoulder muscle moves under your hand as he finger fucks you. "Forever. Never want you to stop touching me."

The serious shake of his head is oddly endearing. "Could never leave you alone. Not after this."

You smile. "Besides," you sigh as he curls his fingers inside you and whispers against the perfect spot, "you have to show me all the- oh, fuck, right there. Kriffing fuck, Tai, right there." He's grinning and you want to kiss it right off him. "Hafta show me, uh, all the horrible things you want to do to me-!"

He's angled your leg further up his torso, opening you up a little more for him, and now his fingers are hitting you deeper than anything you can remember. Shit, you're gonna come again and he's not even inside you yet.

"That's it," he hums when your legs start shaking.

You're meeting every thrust with a roll of your hips, desperate, breathy, whining, absolutely falling apart. "Want you inside me, baby. Tai, Tai, fuck, I wanna... wanna..."

Lips on the curve of your jaw, sucking what you know is going to be a beautiful mark into your skin. "Shh. Give me one more. One more, my love. Then I'll fuck you right."

You give him two. He licks his fingers clean while you watch on, little more than a boneless lump of flesh after three climaxes. Your slick has started to seep onto your thighs. It's probably wetting the sheets by now and you honestly couldn't care less. You'd let this man ruin your bed in every way, sheets to frame, and you'd thank him for it. He could ruin your kriffing life and you'd still look at him like he was the galaxy itself.

Tai is gentle when he slips his length along the seam of you, gathering a bit of your arousal before he finally, blessedly pushes into you exactly where you've been aching for him for two blasted weeks. He doesn't hold back any of himself, doesn't hide the way he groans as you shudder around him, doesn't shy away from the obscene grunt that wrenches out of him when he bottoms out. He takes each of your legs in hand, grasping right behind your knees, and spreads them as far as you can stand.

"Take me so well," he hisses, his face all wrinkled with pleasure.

Your mouth lands on the tendon between his neck and his shoulder and in the haze of orgasms and fullness and the very scent of him, you can't decide if you want to kiss him or lick the sweat off him or bite him just to see what the fuck he'll do. You settle for all three. And it sends his hips bucking into yours with enough force to make your teeth rattle.

"Could live. Between your thighs." He's punctuating every thrust with something beautiful and profane. "Don't. Don't deserve you, sweet girl."

Even now though, blissed out as you are, you aren't going to let that slide. You fix him with the stubbornest little stink eye you can conjure up and grab hold of his shoulders as he fucks into you, strong and steady.

"Don't you dare. You have me, idiot. Willingly."

He raises an eyebrow in mock seriousness. "That so?"

Maker, he's so ornery. You find yourself wondering if he's always been this much of a shit. But with the way he's taking you right now, you can't recall what you had for lunch, let alone the past month and a half. But your irritation sneaks out anyway.

"Wouldn't let you fuck my cunt if I didn't want you."

His hand is in your hair faster than you can blink and suddenly your head is snapped back, your neck arched up as Tai growls, fucking growls into it. Your legs are almost pinned to your chest. The edge of his pubic pone is ghosting over your clit. Pleasure-pain is blossoming up the inside of your thighs, all the way to your cervix where his head is pressing into you, and he's muttering filth in your ear like there's no tomorrow.

"...to take you on every surface in this apartment. Bend you over the sofa. Eat you out on the table. Pin you to the wall and have my fucking way with you." And when you shudder against him so violently that your jaw hurts, he sucks another mark into your throat. "You like that, my love? Huh? You want a beat up old veteran that bad?"

You're grasping at the back of his head like it's your lifeline. You won't last much longer, you probably have less than a minute before your body completely breaks down. You're borderline delirious, but you manage to get your tongue working again.

"My old veteran." Right now in this otherworldly dimension of Tai and heat and skin on skin, you find it so stupidly funny that he thinks he's not worthy of you. He's such an idiot in this one respect. Doesn't he realize you're his now? "Favorite stupid old veteran."

"Watch it," he teases, but there's no bite. You can hear the laughter in it.

You laugh too. "What... 're you gonna do? Fuck me?"

One of his hands sneaks down between you and rolls your clit between his forefinger and his thumb, and you break with a caterwaul. There's a wet warmth seeping out underneath you and it should probably gross you out, but in the moment you think it's kinda nice. It's an intense, numbing, cozy sort of climax that renders you speechless by its end. And Tai's still buried in you, thrusting and thrusting until he finally whimpers and releases into you, and it feels right.

He's just right. You tell him so.

He smiles and kisses your cheek, then your lips, then the tip of your nose. "I love you, too."

#clone trooper x reader #clone veteran x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #kenobi clone trooper #clone trooper tai #star wars #i know i know my smut needs work. but i had fun and hopefully so did the rest of you!

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imarvelatthestars · 4 months

Text

E Ipo

Pairing: Tai x gn!Reader

Content: so much fluff that you might die and not a whisper of angst to be found (for once!)

suggested listening - E Ipo as sung by Tem himself

Sometimes all you can do is watch him. You study the slope of his shoulders through his shirt, the way his muscles move beneath his skin. You note the crinkles at his eyes and the dimples in his cheeks. You see a whole life detailed to you in his body, and you think you're the luckiest person alive.

"I love you," you tell him as you wrap your arms around his barrel chest from behind, bury your cheek in the blade of his shoulder, and inhale his scent.

He pauses his kaf-brewing to wrap one of his hands around yours, to guide your palm to the swell of his lips where he presses a kiss to each of your fingerprints. It's the same as it always is whenever he kisses you: your body thrills at the touch, your heart bubbles over with affection, and your entire face goes hot.

"E taku ipo," he rumbles in that gorgeous sandpaper voice. My beloved.

You smile and kiss his shoulder through his shirt. "No, you," you giggle, and he laughs in turn.

He's not fast, this old soldier. He takes his time now, chooses to enjoy the journey rather than to rush things as he once did in his youth, so it's a gradual thing when he shifts and turns so his back is to the counter and you are properly in his arms. He kisses you slowly. His hands roam your body, searching for what you never know, but they eventually find their home - one on your hip and the other grasping one of your hands - and then you're dancing.

Knees bump knees, socked feet knock against slippers, and the kitchen is quiet save for the sound of your four feet shuffling on the floor. He sings, though it starts off as a gentle hum low in his throat. Something soft and pleasant, something you think you've heard him sing to himself before, but you can't be sure.

"Ahakoa haere koe ki hea, māku rā koe e whai atu e."

It's been a long few months since he started teaching you his language. It sounds natural in his mouth, elongated vowels and elegant consonants that always seem to follow a rhythm you can never hear, a heartbeat somewhere in his chest that dictates the pattern of his speech. It's harder for you, but you try for him, because you know it means something between home and belonging.

Wherever you may go, I will always pursue you.

He doesn't know just how true the translation rings. For him, of course, you know he means it, but the words are just as true as if you had been the one to speak them.

"Ko tōku aroha kau tonu."

His nose brushes against yours as he suddenly spins you both in a circle, drawing you closer with his hand now pressing to the small of your back.

My love for you will remain.

Your palms rests flat on his chest for balance, for stability, for the comfort of him, but it drifts now to his throat, his cheek. Your thumb ghosts across one of his dimples and his smile deepens, and you swear it's like falling in love all over again.

"Tēnā rā, e hine, huri mai rā ki ahau e tau nei hei, utanga atu, e ipo."

And it should embarrass you how you flush when he tilts your face towards his, your chin tucked between his fingers. It should be embarrassing how he makes your heart race and your soul leap for joy, how a single look is enough to make you fall at his feet.

Please, my love, turn back to me now and I will commit myself to you, o beloved.

There's a moment between this verse and the next, hardly a second for him to breathe and continue on, but you make it last with a stolen kiss that lingers on both your lips. Tai smiles, his eyes fluttering as he seems to process the movement, the memory, the taste.

"Aue." He ducks his head down to kiss you again. And again. "Steal my breath away every time, sweetheart."

The song is forgotten. But that's alright.

You rest of your head on his shoulder and sigh, smiling. For now, what matters most is this moment with him, the rich timbre of his voice, the beat of his pulse through his sternum, your hand in his, his heart forever a part of yours.

prompt(s): music + "slow dancing with tai in the kitchen while he sings to you" from @arandomnerdsblog578 🎶✔️

@clonexreaderbingo

#tai x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #daiyu veteran x reader #clone trooper tai #daiyu veteran #tai #star wars #x reader #cfb2023 #clone x reader #clone trooper x reader #clone x reader bingo

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imarvelatthestars · 6 months

Note

I saw you reblogged some prompts. Could I be so bold as to request:

❛ you're mine. you've always been mine. ❜ with Tai please 🥰

my husband my husband my husband, sev i love you so dearly for requesting this

instead of doing homework, i am writing a lil drabble for my man & you can't stop me

18+ Tai filth below the cut

He must feel lonely sometimes, you realize. He once had so many brothers, now there's really only you, and Cody if you're being generous. Perhaps that's why he does this, why he buries himself in your warmth, in your arms, nuzzles his nose into your pulse point, and takes whatever you will give him.

"That's it," he grunts into your neck, his hips slowly and steadily rocking into yours. "Ngh, you're so, so good t' me, sweetheart."

You secretly love it when he gets like this, when he rolls you onto your side and props your knee upon his waist, and goes so slow, so strong, always giving and taking and lavishing you with his affection. A tongue across your collarbone, his teeth at your throat, his heavy exhalations on your skin as he rocks and moans and, sometimes, even begs.

You choke on your own breath when his fingers slip between you and catch on your clit, the broad, rough pads of his fingers always stimulate you just right.

"Say it again," he asks. "Please."

And you've never been able to deny him anything.

You want to whisper it in his ear, but the position isn't right for it, so you settle instead for resting your forehead on his, inhaling the very air that stirs in his lungs. And you smile.

"You're mine, baby." His moan turns into a wail and in an instant, he's thrusting into you harder and faster than before, and you can hardly catch your breath. "Always. Always been, been mine! Fuck!"

He's so close, and he's dragging you over the edge with him, desperate and hot and all-encompassing.

"Tai, Tai, baby, so close."

He rolls you onto your back now, and takes your other leg in hand so he can spread it as far as you can stretch, so you'll make room for all of him, those big, wide shoulders, the hefty weight of his stomach, the breadth of his thighs.

"Again," he says, and it's something between a demand and a request.

Your legs are beginning to shake. A scream is building up beneath your sternum, taking all its energy from the coil of interstellar pleasure pooling between your legs. You can barely keep your eyes open. "Tai-"

"Again. C'mon."

Fingers tangle in the sleep shirt rucked halfway up his torso, wrap around the back of his neck to drag him even closer, to egg him on. "You'vealwaysbeenmine, fuckfuckfuck, Tai, please!"

He comes first. He punches himself so deep inside you that it takes your breath away, and then he's everywhere, hot and wet, shaking so hard you're half convinced he'll keel over in a second. It takes him a moment to compose himself and recover, but when he does, he looks down at you with those big, kaf brown eyes, and he smiles that smile that always makes your heart skip a beat. You can see the unshed tears caught in his lashes.

Even as he softens inside you, he still rocks his hips forward, still tries to give you what you need even when his body is spent. He runs his hands up the backs of your thighs and keeps you spread apart for him as he leans down and captures your mouth in perhaps the most chaste, but most romantic kiss he's ever given you.

"You love me?"

You nod eagerly. "You know I do."

Your body spasms when his thumb passes through your lips and rubs a perfect circle around your clit. Tai smiles, but it's mischievous now, sparkling with that bit of confidence he didn't have earlier. "Then let me take care of you, my love."

And he does.

#well. back at it again at the krispy kreme #tai x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #yes this is part of the tai saga. probably somewhere between the 4th and 6th chapters? loosely?#anyways thinking about big boy tai again. that's probably the mantra of 2023 tbh #this also was not edited. it just kinda came out of me (lol)

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imarvelatthestars · 10 months

Text

All Work, Some Play

Pairings: Tai x f!Reader

Warnings: 18+ horniness afoot, there is no plot; mutual masturbation, voyeurism, dirty talk, poor time management, some fluff at the end

Notes: this is not part of my Tai series, this is just a fun little 'the empire never happened' au thing that came to mind while I was working on homework.

This is all because you're greedy. It's a good kind of greedy, the kind that leaves you satisfied in bed, on the couch, on the table, anywhere he's willing to satisfy you, and you'd thought he would satisfy you again this time, but he put his foot down.

"You need to study, sweetheart."

And you'd whined and batted your pretty little eyes and promised him you'd do whatever he wanted, anything at all, if he'd just touch you for a bit, get your mind off the endless pages of text you've been dragging yourself through for hours now. But the one person who cares about your education as much as you, perhaps even more, is Tai.

He's not unkind, though. He knows just how to string you along and really make you work for it. He'd gently posed his counteroffer with his nose nuzzled into your neck: "Why don't you stuff yourself with something, if you need it so bad, hm? Sit at your desk like a good girl and do your work, pretend it's me you're riding."

The moan that bubbled out of you was damn near pornographic. You could feel your eyes rolling back, his breath on your skin. "Tai, baby, please."

"Please?" he echoed, pretending to be confused by your unfinished plea.

"You can't... can't say things like that."

He'd chuckled. "It's that or nothing, my love."

You're not sure how long it's been since then. You're as comfortable as you can be, perched on the literal edge of your seat, and doing your damnedest to gain as much friction as possible, to hit that too elusive spot that you only manage to get about half the time, all the while pretending you're not a whimpering, melting mess. You're trying to read, you're trying so hard, really, but he's not making it easy for you either. Sitting there across the room, watching you entirely unashamedly, smug and cocky and as handsome as ever.

"You focusing?" he rumbles once he notices how your eyes have strayed about as far from the console as they can go.

You huff. "Shut up, old man."

When he laughs, you feel the tension lighten for a moment and it makes your heart flutter. Even when you're in some contrived little scenario like this, he still feels like home. The desperate need for more arousal and more pleasure shifts then, it becomes some gentle, tender thing that simply longs for the light in his eyes and the smile on his face and the scruff he hasn't yet shaved.

"I was wondering where my little minx ran off to. Thought she'd gotten lost."

"Not lost. Just running circles around you." The remark isn't as biting as you want it to be when it's accompanied by a sharp, gasping whine.

Tai smiles and this time, it's like a loth wolf smiling at its prey. He tilts his head to one side and thinks, watches you arch and shudder and try and fail to stay focused on your work. You wonder how long he'll play this game before one of you finally breaks.

His eyes are like a brand on your skin as they drift up and down your body. "That's not what it looks like from here."

Fuck. Another lightning strike of arousal straight through your body.

"Then what does it look like?" you ask, and you pretend you don't want him to bend you over your desk right now and finish what he started.

The leather squeaks when he shifts his hips a bit, settles further into the seat and plants his feet on the floor so he can - oh kriffing fucking dank fucking farrik, so he can unzip his trousers and take himself in hand. You're mesmerized by the slow tracing of his thumb over his head, the way his fingers close around his dick and tug.

"Looks to me," and he's already breathless, "like someone won't get to come yet. Since she's not staying focused." He's watching you again, chin tucked into his chest as he starts jerking up and down along his length, looking up from under his lashes and fucking laughing again. "But I will."

Wait. No. No no no no no no, that's not fair, how is that fair? He's not touching you, you're at your desk, you're trying. That was the deal, wasn't it?

"Tai-"

"Unless you can finish the next page before I come, it looks like you'll just have to wait until your assignment's done."

If you don't get this man inside you in the next five minutes, you're probably gonna die.

"I can do that," you promise as your hips jerk forward unbidden, chasing the gentle sound of his grunts and moans. "I can do it, baby, I swear. Please."

You've never read something so fast in your whole life. You read it once, skim it twice, you mark a couple notes down on your flimsi pad for good measure because you know there's absolutely no chance you'll remember any of it after he puts his hands on you, and then you're slamming your hands down on the desk.

"I did it!" you pant. "I did it. I finished the page, I'm done, Tai, please-"

He's so close already. You can see how his forehead's all wrinkled and he's thrusting into his hand, biting down on the inside of his cheek to quiet himself, but he makes the most beautiful noises all the same. You need him more than you've ever needed anything.

And when he speaks, it's like fire in your belly. "Touch yourself. For me?"

Your hands are in your underwear in an instant and icy hot pleasure licks down your spine, head to toe, until you're shaking. Your head rolls back, your eyes squeeze shut, you're riding the edge of your seat with that damn dildo pressed so far inside you that you're seeing shapes behind your eyelids, and now you're careening towards your own end. An eternity of build up and you're about to crash and burn, and nothing's ever felt this good.

"Let me hear you, mesh'la. Come for me. When you're good and ready."

The moan you give him utterly wrecks your throat. You struggle against the sudden weight of your skull to sit up a bit, fingers rubbing over your clit as you fixate on the image of your man sprawled out in his chair, thighs spread, his exposed throat bobbing and choking on air. He's so beautiful. He's so beautiful. You could watch him forever.

"Tai." It's a hoarse whisper, much rougher than you usually sound. "Need you, baby."

He smiles for a moment, sends you a wink, and nods. "Show me. Show me, my love. I'll fuck you how you need, ner kar'ta, make you mine. Come on. Just, ngh, just show me."

It might be the way his eyes are tracing your figure like you're a work of art, like he can see you in every dimension, like he sees exactly how he makes you tremble, or maybe it's the way his tummy clenches when he runs his fingers over his head and licks his lips and pretends it's you he's fucking. Maybe it's the fact that you know once you both come, he'll probably fuck you within an inch of your life, but whatever it is, it makes you come hard and fast. Your head snaps back, your legs seize up, and you full-on scream when your orgasm finally hits you.

Everything goes kind of fuzzy for a bit. Your ears are stuffy and your vision is hazy, and your hand is soaked. Everything from the depths of your cunt to the tops of your thighs is sore. It's amazing.

There's a slight strain in Tai's voice when he finally speaks. "Still with me?"

The ceiling stares back at you. "Still with you." You can hear him panting and you can't help it, you really can't. "Need a break, old timer?"

The chair creaks in protest when he stands and oh, you're in for it now, but there's nowhere else you'd rather be. You're legs are still spread, your hand still caught under your underwear when he makes his way over to you, his waistband unbuttoned and belt undone but everything else is where it should be. Shame.

His pulse is still ticking in his throat when he settles between you and the desk. "The only thing I need a break from is your sass."

"You love it."

"I love something about you." His tongue steals out across his lower lip and his eyes are sparkling. "Not sure what." But when you beam up at him and spread your legs just an inch wider, he smiles. "Must be that little cunt of yours that always gets you into trouble."

"Must be."

Later, in your bed, after a handful of orgasms and pretty sighs and desperate pleas, the covers around your hips and your bodies pressed together, Tai nuzzles his nose into your sternum and presses a kiss to your sweat-slicked skin. "I love this." His fingers tap out the rhythm of your heart.

You kiss the crown of his head. Then his cheek. His mouth. The tip of his nose. "It's yours."

It always will be.

taglist: @moodymisty @rain-on-kamino @dystopicjumpsuit @temple-elder @wanderer-six @jambolska-grozdova @andrakass2 @curly-funk

#clone trooper tai #clone trooper tai x reader #tai x reader #star wars #he's not really a homeless veteran in this au so i won't add those tags. this is for the tai TM girlies (gn)#tai #he's so husband i want him so bad

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imarvelatthestars · 1 year

Text

Fluorescence

Pairings: Clone Trooper Veteran (from Kenobi) Tai x Reader

Warnings: Tai and reader harassed w/ anti-clone sentiments and sexual innuendos, canon typical violence

Notes: Okay so this got really far away from me. Is it totally extra? Yeah. Did I get a really wild plot hair and want to explore it? Also yeah. Just bear with me here.

@moodymisty - more Tai!

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"Wear something nice, my love," he'd told you yesterday when he insisted on taking you out for a proper date. Which had led to this very moment, standing in front of your mirror, exasperated with a beaten down morale because nothing you've tried on has fit right. Your usual favorites that show off your best features are in the laundry basket, and four other possible outfits have been strewn across your bed in frustration.

That's how Tai finds you when he comes home, still smelling of chemicals and sweat when he kisses your cheek and nuzzles into your skin. And all your anxieties melt away. He has this magic about him, something that always reminds you of what really matters and right now, it doesn't really matter what you're wearing. You know he'll love you no matter what silly little outfit you put on, just like you'll love him no matter what he is or isn't wearing.

And dinner goes perfectly. He does his best to charm you - as if he hasn't already, as if he doesn't already have your heart, soul, and everything else in between - and you do your best to make him laugh that rumbly chuckle of his. He buys you expensive wine and you don't have the heart to tell him it tastes awful. The neon fluorescents from outside cast shadows across his face and illuminate his pores like the first night you spoke to him. He's beautiful. It's perfect.

The walk back to your apartment is perfect, too. It feels right to hold his hand in public. You're sure you're literally beaming because of this one simple act because your chest feels so full of adoration that it can't possibly all be contained within you. You want to shout it to the world, to the entire galaxy. Tai is yours and you are his, and this night has only made you more sure of the realization you've been hurtling toward since the first night you saw him all cleaned up.

Your head leans over to rest on his shoulder as you continue strolling through the market. You feel lazy and content with your belly full of drink and hearty food, with Tai's warmth seeping up your arm. Everything is right.

Until it isn't.

You'd have thought it impossible, but the sound of raucous laughter somehow manages to carry over the busy sounds of the street. You don't think much of it at first, probably just a group of kids getting into mischief, but you notice almost instantly how severely Tai reacts to it. His hand goes stiff in yours, fingers unfurling as his body goes rigid. One glance at his face shows the panic stricken look in his eyes and the set angle of his jaw, and your heart plummets.

"Tai? Love, what's wr-"

"Hey, look who it is!" The voice is a man's, it's a distinct Outer Rim accent, and there's a clear ring of sarcasm in it that threatens to rip your heart right out of your chest. "Where you going so fast, trooper?"

Your breath catches in your throat when you finally spot the culprits - two storm troopers, one with his helmet off to reveal a pasty face and drunken, hazy eyes. Kriffing karking fuck, this is not good.

The helmeted trooper elbows the other one, seemingly more sober than his companion. "'cept he's not a trooper anymore, is he?"

The drunk snickers and you swear Tai's hand starts to shake. "Nah, he's all cleaned up now, isn't he? Got himself a girl and everything."

That seems to snap Tai out of his head because his grip suddenly tightens on your hand, so tight that it hurts, and he draws himself to his full height, shoulders squared, and flashes that soldier look in his eyes you've only seen two or three times before.

"Come on," he mutters as he starts to pull you in the opposite direction. But a gloved hand armored in plastoid comes down on his shoulder before you can take more than two steps.

"You weren't dismissed, trooper."

Tai's nostrils flare just slightly. His eyes burn. "You are not my commanding officer and I am no longer under anyone's jurisdiction." He shrugs the trooper's hand off and you can see in the way he swallows hard enough to make his throat bob, he's holding himself back, biting his tongue as much as he can stomach. "You can't detain us."

"No," says the one in the helmet, "but we can detain traitors to the Empire." You're going to throw up. Or pass out. Maybe both. Because then the trooper steps so close that his helmet almost brushes Tai's nose and he jabs his finger into his chest. "I'd say you fit the bill."

The entire planet could crumble around you, bury you under its rubble, and it would be less painful than this. You're not sure if the look on Tai's face, angry and bitter and somehow resigned, or the threat lingering in the air is worse.

"Didjya know all clones are traitors? Eh, civvy?" You don't dare to look at this man, not even as he stumbles toward you and huffs so forcefully that his liquored breath hits you right in the face. "They murdered all the Jedi. S'pose we outta thank them for that, huh? But I think it just shows they're untrustworthy. The whole lot of 'em."

You're terrified. You don't know if you've ever been this terrified. Because you know storm troopers aren't to be trusted. You know they do what they want, when they want, how they want. They're the hands of the Empire, after all. And everyone knows what happens to the people who fight the Empire.

"Some of 'em even betrayed the Empire. Ungrateful," the drunk laughs. "Bet you were one of 'em, weren't you? Bet you malfunctioned like the rest of your cannon fodder copies did and that's why they kicked you out."

Tai suddenly goes stumbling backward, his breath knocked out of him into a wordless grunt as the spotchka-scented trooper laughs again. Like he's getting off on it. And then he sets his sights on you. Tai hasn't even managed to stand yet.

"You wanna know what it's like with a real trooper, sweetheart? We could show you a good time."

"Fuck off," you spit. And even though you're shaking, even though he's backing you into the corner between two stalls, you're not letting this creep tough you.

You just catch a glimpse of Tai barreling down on you both, one arm reeled back and his face so contorted by rage that he's almost unrecognizable, but the other trooper comes out of nowhere and the punch he lands on your lover's jaw is loud enough to make you feel sick. Tai drops like a rock and suddenly your back is flush with the wall of some vendor's set up.

"What, you think you're too good for us? 'cause you're some clone's bitch?"

And something deep inside you, something hot and vulgar and righteous that has laid in wait suddenly springs to life. It swells in your mouth until it's ready and it bursts out of you like an eruption. Your hands are on the troopers chestplate, shoving with every ounce of strength you possess. All thoughts of keeping your head down, of staying quiet until the troopers decide you're no fun, they're out the fucking window because they dared to put their hands on Tai. They dared to question the home he's made in your heart.

"I said, fuck off!" you roar and the trooper goes tripping over his own heels right into his comrade. "I'm his bitch and I'm proud of it, you sick Imp fuck."

You can't even see straight. Everything is warped. You feel ten times taller and broader and stronger than you really are as your fury starts to burn through you. You move to stand in front of Tai, your bloody mess of a man kneeling on the pavement, and you stare those Imperial assholes down as they struggle to pick themselves back up again. One of them moves to unclip the blaster from his belt and then the world is upside down, literally.

You're at a strange angle, Tai's body pressed into you from above, blaster fire, people shouting, it's all chaos. You don't realize you're running until the world stops spinning. But everything feels off kilter. Anger is still burning so fiercely inside you that you're sure you're about to burst, adrenaline is thrumming through your every vein, the food and drink in your stomach is sloshing about uncomfortably and if you don't stop bouncing round soon, you're probably going to be sick. But Tai won't stop running and he won't let you stop either. You don't have the breath to ask why. The blaster fire is a pretty good indication anyways.

"Are you hurt?"

His hands are on you the instant you stumble into your apartment. The chrono on the wall says it's only been half an hour since you left the restaurant. Is that all?

"I'm fine," you try, but Tai is frantic. He's peeling back your sleeves, pulling at them hem of your clothes so he can inspect your skin. "Tai, I'm fine."

He's shaking. "He put his hands on you." Oh maker, he's crying.

"No. He tried. He tried, but I didn't let him." You're shaking too. You let him undress you until your entire torso is bare, except for your binder. His fingers are rough and battle worn, his hands are broad and clammy, but they are a miracle on your skin. "I'm okay."

And then his hands are at your neck and the back of your skull, guiding you to come crashing into his chest. His breath rattles in his chest like a death cry. It's a fragile thing and he feels infinitely more breakable. You feel... well, you're not sure how you feel. You know you can't make your hands stop trembling like leaves in a breeze, you know you're steadily coming back to planet and resettling in reality, you know you're scared and confused and, mostly, worried. You know that you don't want him to stop touching you because if he does, you're sure to collapse.

He's murmuring senseless exhalations into your skin, your hair, holding you like you're the last parachute on a plummeting transport. You catch snippets of phrases - "can't", "safe", "have to", "please".

"Tai." It takes a second, but you manage to unwind his arms from your ribcage and his fingers from your hair. "Sit. Let's sit. Honey, please, before your legs give out."

The sofa squeaks and creaks under your weight. Your heart hurts. You haven't seen him this shaken since the night his nightmares woke him, but that was weeks ago and this is different. The danger he's running from can't be chased away with a mug of kaf or tea, this much you know. A warm drink can't chase away the fact that you assaulted an Imperial trooper. It doesn't matter that the Imps started the fight first or that they laid hands first because no one will see it that way. This danger is alive and waiting in the shadows of the present and worse than any memories brought about by Tai's own doing, this one is all on you.

You did this.

You run your hand over the top of his head down to his neck. There are shadows in his eyes, the kind that city lights can't diminish.

You did this and you have to fix this.

Your mouth fits into the corner of his as perfectly as it ever has. "Stay here, love. Be right back."

The dissociated bobbing of his head only make you feel worse about leaving. But you need to. You hurry into your room and make sure the door is completely shut behind you before you start rifling through things. No need to worry him unnecessarily.

A list starts racking up in the back of your mind. Your jewelry box could fetch a couple credits, maybe more if you include all the jewelry inside it. Your grandmother's heart would break to know you'd sold it, but this was more important. Tai's more important. You have a stash of leftover change under your bed that you've been saving for emergencies, that has to amount to something, right? You don't have much else that's worth anything, but you still have some money in the bank. Add it all up and you could easily cover bail for a person or two... Right?

As you gather it all in your arms, you steel yourself against the reaction you're sure to get from Tai, how he won't want you to use your money on his stupid old self, "don't sell that, my love, not something that special, not for me". He is right about one thing, the same thing as always. He's so kriffing stupid sometimes.

What you hadn't been sure of, though, was this.

The door opens and he's rushing out of the bathroom. His shoulders are all curled in on themselves. You poke your head in and feel something awful settle in the pit of your stomach for the second time today because all his things, his toothbrush and his razor and his aftershave that smells like Alderaani oak, they're gone. Then you follow him to the sofa where he's emptied out his work bag to stuff in some of his clothes from the hamper. And his grooming supplies.

"What are you doing?"

He doesn't even falter, not once.

"Why are you... Tai, baby. Please. What are you doing?"

A slice of light from the window catches one of his eyes as he turns on you. He's clearly panicked, but there's still that look of a soldier about him. It hasn't gone away since those troopers first cornered you.

The thing is, you don't even need to ask. You know exactly what he's doing. You can guess for yourself what's running through his head: you're not safe with me around, I'm putting you in danger, it's better if I go, you're better off without me, I'm too damaged for you.

"Please don't." You dump your own things onto the cushion beside his bag. You reach for him and relief floods through you when he doesn't shy away. "Don't go. Stay."

"They'll come looking for me," he says.

"I don't care."

That's what finally does it. The vein in his forehead is ticking like a fucking bomb. "I care! The longer I stay, the more I endanger you and I can't-"

"Then let me come with you."

The look he gives you is the same one your mother used to give you when you'd do something stupid. It's a look that doesn't allow questions or leeway. It says 'no', plain and simple. But he's fighting with himself, too, you can see it in the crumpled line of his mouth.

Even after all the time the two of you have already had together, he still doesn't understand. Perhaps he never will. But this, your hand on his skin, the warm earthen tones of his eyes shining just so in the light, his presence in your home - it's all you've ever wanted and you are not giving him up so easily. The galaxy will have to kill you first.

You approach him with all the cautious quietness you would with a frightened animal. Then comes your hand on his shoulder, an attempt to ground him to you. You step into his space, thigh brushing thigh, chest to chest, stomach to stomach, you let him feel you, remember that you're still here.

"I assaulted a trooper, Tai. If they're going to come for anyone, it's going to be me. I need you right now."

His mouth twists into a frown as he gazes down at you. "They've got it out for me. I'll only make things worse. If I stay."

"I love you. And if you think that I want to stay here in this shitty apartment and face the Empire without you, then you're an idiot." Tears are stinging along your waterline. "It would be empty without you, Tai. I would be empty."

It's hard to read him. Even without his helmet, his face is masked. You can't tell if you're getting through or not and he won't even look at you properly, and it's breaking your heart.

"I'll pack a bag. We can go to the bank, withdraw all my credits, sell a few things, and hop on the first transport out of here. Maybe we can find a planet out of the way, beyond the Outer Rim? Maybe someone out there could help us?"

His hands are heavy when they finally settle on your hips. "I'm not-... I can't- I can't endanger you. Not anymore. If you come with me, you'll be putting a target on your back. All this," he gestures with a grand sweep of an arm, "will be gone! The Empire-"

"This is just an apartment! Tai. It's not home." Your entire mouth is trembling. "It could never be home. I don't give a shit about this place. Or this planet. Home is with you. Please, please don't take that away from me.

"If it's Daiyu or you, I choose you. If it's a normal life with two-point-five kids with a respectable spouse or being on the run with you, I choose. You. Always."

And you kiss him. You kiss him like your life depends on it, like you'll shatter if you cannot touch him, like the air itself will depart your lungs if he doesn't let you follow him to the ends of the universe. It's practically the truth, anyway. Life wouldn't be the same without him.

"Five minutes," you whisper between frantic, tragic presses of lips to tongue and teeth and jawbones. "Please. Please, Maker, please, just five minutes. Don't go anywhere. Don't leave me."

You're fully crying now. You think he is, too. His palm skirts up and over your cheek, draws you so impossibly close that for a moment there's nothing but atoms between you.

You drag him into your room, still half kissing and mostly crying. You're not letting him out of your sight. You're going to pack a bag and he's going to watch and then the two of you will leave this stinking dankhole behind for good. And if anyone tries to stop you, you'll burn the entire planet down to its foundations. This weary old veteran is yours, always.

The whole city is crawling with TKs, more than usual. It's a heavy weight at the base of his spine, a voice in the back of his head warning him to get out now while he still can. It's too dangerous. He'll be lucky to get out of here with his life, let alone with the life of another. And while there's some truth to that gut feeling clawing up the inside of his stomach, he also knows that he would regret it for the rest of his life if he doesn't even try.

A man is the sum of his choices, a clone even more so, and he is a good man. He has to be. He's chosen to be, after all this time. He has a duty.

So he clings to the shadows, cloak pulled up over his head. He follows the map on his vambrace until it leads him to a questionable part of town where the buildings are crumbling and the people in it look weary, haggard. He slips inside one, an apartment complex that seems to lean ever so slightly to one side, its walls are beiging with age and the floorboards groan underfoot. Derelict would truly be too kind of a word.

It's five or six stories up when he finds the door he's looking for. There's a potted plant and a welcome mat, but the plant is wilted and the mat is worn and faded, albeit quite cheerful. It matches the description he's been given of a woman with a kind smile and a fondness for veterans. He raps his knuckles on the plasteel.

The silence is so loud it hurts his ears. He's straining to hear something, anything on the other side of the door, hoping against hope, daring to drift so far into desperation as to pray to a Maker, a Force, anything that could be listening and might help.

Then he hears it - footsteps. It sounds like more than one set. Dank farrik, is he really so lucky?

"Who is it?" your voice, muffled and tinny, maybe a little nervous.

All his preparation fails him in this moment, though. The days of travel and quiet contemplation, his consideration of traffic lanes and typical business hours and old strategies he never thought he'd use again, it all goes flying right out the back window and the only thing he can do is stammer together some kind of response.

"... I'm looking for someone. A friend of mine. I was told you might know him."

More shuffling. He can practically hear the cogs turning in your mind, likely weighing every pro and con of opening the door or continuing the conversation.

"And who are you?" you ask and this time he knows for sure that you're afraid.

He sighs. He didn't miss the arrest warrants on the tablets and bounty pucks on his way here, especially not the too familiar face on one of them.

"My name's Cody, ma'am. I'm here to help."

His heart thunders twice in double time, a worried thump thump against the swell of his ribcage. For a moment, he's back on the battlefield, blasters and torpedoes erupting all around him, soil raining down on his helmet as he shouts out orders. And then he blinks and the battlefield melts into the plasteel door hissing open. There is you, wide-eyed and very clearly confused, and at your side is a brother. He's older, broader, hesitant and disbelieving, but hopeful. Cody can see it in the whites of his eyes. He also sees the bags packed to the point of overfilling settled on both your shoulders.

"Commander?" says the trooper, breathless, and there is a glimmer of relief in Cody's chest.

#clone trooper x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #clone trooper veteran #clone trooper tai #clone veteran #star wars #hello welcome back to part 1 million of the tai saga!!! i'm so so so so so excited for this one!!!

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imarvelatthestars · 1 year

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Forgiveness

Notes: I reused the same gif as last time, so sue me. I'm kind of vaguely basing his appearance off of Tem's character in Aquaman, kind of not. @moodymisty I have an update for you!

Pairing: Clone Trooper Veteran Tai (from Kenobi) x f!Reader

Warnings: making out, talk of drunken flirting/innuendo

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Everything hurts the moment you open your eyes. The light pouring in from between the blinds is too, too bright, your body is insufferably warm under the covers, and your mouth feels sticky and dry. You can still taste remnants of alcohol on your teeth.

Stars above, the hell did I do last night?

A guttural moan rumbles out of you as you roll onto your side and squint in the general direction of your window. It takes a moment, a long, long moment, but flickers of last night start coming back to you. The bar, your minimum 3 and horrifyingly, very possibly more than 3 shots, the music that screamed so loudly you could feel it inside your skull. Tai.

Electricity screams through every vein and up your spine into your brain where it jolts you upright.

Oh Maker, Tai.

You were so wasted last night that you weren't your usual self. You were unfiltered, raw and wanting. You dragged him out onto that dance floor and-. Your face goes scalding hot with shame. The way you'd danced with him was the exact opposite of everything you'd been trying to be with him; instead of being patient and restrained, you were clingy and flirty. And he'd danced with you.

Suddenly the room is spinning and it's not because of your hangover. He'd danced with you. Sure, he'd been hesitant at first and you certainly couldn't blame him for that, but something had changed when you cupped his face in your hand. He'd moved differently with you, held you closer, tighter. If you weren't still pushing through the mental fog of your final shots, you might have even said it was intimate.

But that dry, sticky feeling in your mouth draws you out of it. Arguably, it draws you into a deeper, darker spiral. Because you can't remember coming home. Or getting into bed. And you're terrified you might have done something that you'll regret.

You're stumbling out of your bed, covers flying through the air and heart in your mouth. You have to be sure. Tai wasn't in bed with you when you woke up, so that's a good start, but you have to be certain. You don't want to ruin whatever it is you've forged with him, you can't ruin it. Or him. You can't lose him and the thought that you might have fucked it all up because you were too intoxicated to hold yourself back is making you feel sick.

No. No, it's not dread that's making you feel sick.

You barely make it to the bathroom before bile hits the back of your throat. Everything that was in your stomach unloads into the bathroom sink, mostly tinted blue from all the spotchka, and fuck, it burns. You turn on the faucet and blink down at the mess you've made.

What the hell are you doing? Going out drinking with a homeless guy? Letting him live in your home? He's a former soldier. He's half a stranger and you're the idiot letting him co-habitate with you. You're the idiot falling in love with him. Why are you falling in love with him?

The person looking back at you in the mirror looks just as perplexed and frustrated as you feel. How long as it been love and you didn't realize it? How long have you been coming home late to see him passed out on your couch and smiled at him with so much fondness that it made your chest ache? How long have you been stealing glances when he isn't looking, watching the way he moves about your space like he belongs in it, watching the muscles in his shoulders grow stronger every day from all the hard labor he's putting himself through? How many nights have you spent lying in bed, tired but unable to sleep, something hungry thrumming beneath your skin while you were too shy to try and soothe that ache with him in the apartment? How many clever smiles of his have you etched into your memory? How many blaster shots to the chest before you admit you're in over your head?

"You alright?"

Tai's voice startles you and you very nearly choke on your own esophagus. You quickly scoop a handful of water into your mouth and gurgle out the remnants of bile before answering.

"Yeah." It comes out as a croak. "Just hungover."

Your chest hurts from the strength of your heart pounding into your ribcage. You swear it's beating out the shape of him into your bones. Best not to dwell on it, on him. You need to clean up. You have a housemate and you need to be presentable. A shower would feel good. And you ought to brush your teeth. You should probably try the toilet while you're in here, too. So you let yourself fall into the mindless routine of it, stripping down and standing under the water, scrubbing yourself until it hurts to wash the embarrassment out of your skin, toweling yourself off, brushing your teeth, rubbing yourself down with lotion. It's better than stopping to think about what you've done, easier.

Until you realize you have no change of clothes. And for all you know, Tai's still standing outside your door. It's unlikely, but it's not impossible. Like him. The impossible man you've fallen impossibly far for. Dank farrik.

It takes all your bravery to press your temple to the door and whisper a hesitant, "Tai?" through the crack. "You there?"

Silence. Your heartbeat is going wild still. But there's no answer. Which means he's probably in by the sofa. If he's turned toward the hallway even slightly, he'll catch a glimpse of you as you leave. It's not an appealing thought coming on the tail end of last night's fiasco, but it's not the end of the galaxy either. You just need to dart into your room for some fresh clothes. It'll be fine.

He's not visible when you crack the door open, so you open it a little further and poke your head out. You catch the back of his head just above the sofa where you guessed he'd be. He's not looking. Run for it!

It's all a rush. You can feel water trickling down your legs, slowly dripping down the nape of your neck and over your temples. You're paranoid the towel's going to slip at exactly the wrong moment, that he'll turn and see you just as it falls and he'll get a full view of your rear, and you know that if that happens, you'd honestly rather just be eaten alive by a rancor. It would be more merciful that way.

None of that happens, though.

You stumble into your bedroom door and stub your toe, which kicks the door open. You know even before you turn to look that he's seen you. Damp. Mostly naked. Running face first into your own door like some idiot who's never walked before. And your fears are confirmed when you spin around to slam the door shut and catch his wide-eyed gaze. His skin is dark enough that you can't tell if he's blushing or not, but something tells you he probably is.

You're no better than an injured wild animal at this point. Someone should just put you out of your misery. You already accosted him in the bar last night, you wouldn't be surprised in the least if you were told you'd tried to kiss him, and now you're running around in the nude with nothing but a towel for privacy? What in the entire fuck is wrong with you? You'll be lucky if he stays another day, let alone another night.

Get dressed, you tell yourself. Pull yourself together. You need to apologize.

That becomes your mantra for the next few minutes. You pull on some undergarments, a roomy sleep shirt, some comfortable bottoms, and then you stop and look at yourself in the mirror on the back of your door. You take in your panic-stricken expression, your wide eyes and the pulse jumping out of your throat, and you sigh. This is as good as it's going to get. And you can't reasonably hide yourself away in here any longer. Sooner or later, you'll have to face him and you'll have to scoop up what remains of your companionship as best you can.

He's there when you swing your door open. He's a singular stride away, one arm already raised as if to knock.

"Tai." His name stumbles out of you in a shocked sort of whisper.

His Adam's apple bobs up and down as he swallows. You look up at him for a moment and he looks down at you, your mouth goes dry and your chest starts to tighten, and even though you're entirely sober, some stupid, feral, idiotic corner of your brain is dying to pull him down to you and kiss him. You think you want to throw up again.

"I'm sorry." He says it almost exactly the same time that you do.

"Why are you sorry?" you ask. "I should be the one apologizing to you."

He frowns. "You have nothing to apologize for. I-..." His head ducks and turns away from you as his frown starts to spread to the rest of his face. "I encouraged you last night. I shouldn't have."

Encouraged you? Does he mean the drinking? Something in your heart hurts. Or does he mean the flirting?

"No, Tai, you're fine. You didn't do anything wrong. I'm the one who got wasted and-." Maker, you don't want to say it but you know you have to. "I know I flirted with you. A lot." You wish a black hole would open under your feet and swallow you. "I'm so sorry. I know we're just friends and I'm so glad we're friends, really. You're amazing. I love having you here."

Shut up. For the sake of your own sanity, shut up! But you can't stop talking. It's like the first night you spoke to him all over again. You're telling him he needs soap all over again. You're trying your best to do a good thing and all you're doing is making it worse. As usual.

"And I-I know that you don't have to stay here and after last night, I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to leave. I can't imagine how uncomfortable you have to be right now, especially after you saw me leaving the shower, and fuck, I'm sorry, Tai. I didn't mean to do that. I just, I wanted to let loose and have fun and then I got drunk and I couldn't control myself properly with all that spotchka in me. Not that that makes what I did okay because it's not, but-."

"I don't want to leave," he rumbles and suddenly the world snaps back into focus. He's shuffled closer to you, not as close as you were at the bar when you danced, when he had his palms in the curve of your waist and you had your hand at the back of his neck, but it's still. Close. "Thought I was the one overstaying my welcome."

You're breathless when you shake your head. "No."

Relentless heat flushes from your face all the way down your body as more memories of your dancing flood your senses. You can still remember his scent, you can almost smell it now with how close he is. You chance a glance up at his eyes and it almost sends a shudder down your spine when you realize it's just like how he looked at you last night. Like he'll die if he's not touching you.

You swallow. "Tai-."

"Felt like a dirty old man dancing with you." His voice is wrecked.

You shake your head. "You're not. You're not, I wanted you to."

"Why?"

You want to grab him by the shoulders and scream it at him. You want to turn and run. You want to ball your hands into fists and cry and rage and pout because after the way you touched him last night, after you traced the shape of his face, after you looked up at him with your drunken 'fuck me' eyes, how could he not know?

Don't make me say it. Don't make me say it just to turn me down, please.

"How did I get home?"

That impossible expression of his shifts into something more down to earth. "I called us a taxi when you couldn't walk on your own. Tried to get you to eat something, but you were... more stubborn than I'd anticipated."

Yeah, that sounded about right. But the question you've been steadily crumbling under the weight of since you woke up still worms its way out of you. Finally.

"Did anything happen?"

Something flickers deep in Tai's eyes and he quickly looks away again. "No," he says with all the authority of the soldier you know he once was. "I would never-."

"I know you wouldn't. I wasn't worried about you."

Your name is pleasant on his tongue, warm and right, and you like how he makes it sound. You like the look he's giving you right now even more. You wonder if that's how you've been looking at him.

He hesitates for a moment and you can see him carefully mulling over his next words. You almost want to hope he's going to ask you, tell you what he wants, how it's exactly what you've been wanting. You almost want him to just take you in his arms and kiss you. His hand is shaking when he moves it, light as a feather, to the curve of your jawbone.

"I don't deserve you."

And everything inside you melts. Because doesn't he see? "I'm not that special," you say.

His eyes drop down below your nose. His thumb shifts ever so slightly to rub into your skin. "You are to me."

You stretch up on your toes and press your mouth into his with all the urgency and gentle longing you've been fighting for Maker knows how long. He starts at first, frozen against you and you worry that maybe you made a mistake, maybe this was one step further than he was willing to go and dammit, why the kriffing fuck did you think this was okay-? And then his mouth opens to yours. The warmth of his breath falls onto your tongue for the briefest of seconds before he's suddenly all you can feel. His tongue on yours, his nose pressing into your cheek, the scratch of his scruff on your chin, his hand cupping the back of your neck so gently, so firmly that you couldn't move even if you wanted to.

Something akin to a whimper slips out of you when his other hand grips at the meat of your waist to pull you into him and it seems to spur him on. He tilts your head back a bit and surges into you, tongue seeking out the roof of your mouth, guiding you into his mouth so he can suck at you, and it only makes you more vocal. Your hands are at his chest, gripping, shaking, pulling, begging for more.

And then, suddenly, you're stumbling backwards. You pull away to try and catch your balance as the world starts to spin, only to realize that it's Tai. Your shoulders hit the wall and arousal drops heavy in the pit of your stomach. Oh.

You don't realize at first that the breathy little sighs and mewls are coming from you. Not until they cut off when he kisses you again. And all that raw, frantic want from last night is bubbling up inside you all over again. You reach for his neck and stretch up into him again. And while you love the look he's gone for with his buzzed hair, you can't help wishing it was just a little longer so you could get a grip on it. You're sure he would make the prettiest sounds if you tugged hard enough.

He pulls away an eternity later and while you lament his absence, you're grateful for the opportunity to properly breathe again. His face hovers over yours, eyes hooded, while his breath warms your chin. And then he smiles.

"What?" you huff, although you're smiling now too.

He ghosts a hand over your hair, down your neck to your shoulder. "I never thought..."

"You're handsome, Tai. Like, really handsome. And you smell good. Not sure why you're surprised."

His laugh warms you down to your toes. "Is that all?"

You tilt your chin up to better see him and you can feel something swelling in your chest. "No," you answer with a shake of your head. "I like you." But that's not what you mean.

He rumbles low in his chest like a purring lothcat and leans down to press his forehead against yours. His gentle exhalation stirs in your lungs. It feels like a kiss. "I like you." You don't think that's what he means either.

#clone trooper x reader #clone trooper veteran x reader #clone veteran x reader #clone trooper tai x reader #kenobi clone trooper #clone veteran #clone trooper tai #star wars #asdgfkahsfjv;sakfjiuaglfvnk.c i love them with my whole heart #tai fans come get y'alls juice

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imarvelatthestars · 5 months

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I - Labyrinth

masterlist

Pairings: f!reader x Tai, Commander Appo, Captain Vaughn, Sergeant Fox, & Sterling [no cl*necest!]

Content: some world building; reader & friends go to a bar and reader gets intoxicated; jealousy, flirting

labyrinth [n., lab·y·rinth] - a complicated irregular network of passages or paths in which it is difficult to find one's way; a maze

It’s been a good two years – arguably the best two years of your life. You no longer live paycheck to paycheck, wondering where your next meal might come from, you don’t lurk in your flat late into the night, lonely and bored to tears and wishing for a friend to share your thoughts with. Now you have five friends, although the word feels too simplistic for what they do for you. The clones that have made your home theirs are more than just friends, more than roommates or even mere acquaintances.

You muse on it now as you watch one of them. Tai leans a bit on his cane as he stands to receive the credits from your latest shopper. He nods pleasantly at the Duros woman, and grunts when he plops himself back into his chair and passes the credits off to you for safekeeping. He’s still so young, yet he carries himself like an old man, grunting and huffing when he moves, his mouth often drawn into a serious line that’s almost impossible to read. But you’re certain you’ve learned to decipher all his tells.

The blink-and-you’ll-miss-it quirk of one side of his mouth, usually his right, means he’s amused. The slow and steady nod paired with weary eyes is usually his way of saying thank you when he doesn’t have the words to express it. The flaring of his nostrils and tightening of his jaw is anger plain and simple, simmering under his skin and threatening to break loose all hell on whoever has caught his ire. This look, though, the empty expression paired with imperceptibly rounded shoulders and the bouncing of his left knee while the other leg is stretched out is the one that makes your heart hurt the most.

“You want some bacta?” you ask as you sort the credits into your makeshift register. “I think there’s a few stims left in my bag.”

Tai has a terrible habit of undermining his own pain. You’ve theorized that he doesn’t want to come off as weak, but you can’t be sure. He’s never really told you. Maybe it’s just pride, or shame. Either way, he often turns down any offers of help from either you or his brothers. This time, though, he doesn’t, and you think the nerve pain must be worse than usual for him to accept the offer on the first try.

You gesture with a nod of your chin in the direction of your bag, propped up against his chair. “G’head. They’re somewhere in there.”

He hesitates to rummage through your things, you can see it in his eyes, in the way his hands stutter, but he finally relents when you raise an eyebrow at him.

He’s always been respectful of your space, like the rest of his brothers. They outnumber you, they’re stronger than you, and they could easily do whatever they liked with your flat, with your most prized possessions, with you, but they have always shown you nothing but respect and kindness. They’ve never encroached on your space even a single time, never made you feel uncomfortable for being the only woman in a flat full of men.

Family. There’s no other word for it. They’re the people you trust most in the galaxy, the ones you run to for support, the ones who make you laugh, the ones who make your life brighter. You love them. They know you do, you’ve said it often enough, yet you still feel as though something’s missing.

They’re your family, but you love them in a way that is distinctly un-familial.

It’s embarrassing. It’s shameful.

But after two years of living with them through good times and bad, you know it’s the truth. You notice them in the way friends should never notice each other – Appo’s sure and steady leadership and that rumbly voice of his that sends shivers down your spine, Vaughn’s loyal and attentive energy that ensures you never feel anxious or alone, Fox’s too-charming smile and the bulky musculature resting beneath tattooed forearms, Sterling’s kindness and respect and that ridiculously attractive way that he combs his hair back, Tai’s gentle yet hidden affection and the stolen smiles that make your heart beat ever faster.

They’re brothers, you remind yourself as you have for a solid year now, ever since these feelings first became manifest. That’s weird. They’d think you’re disgusting. Not for loving them all at once, but for wondering what it would be like to be shared amongst them. For desiring such a thing.

Funny how the simple act of offering help and Tai accepting it is what encourages your mind to leap to such places. This certainly isn’t the first time, either. Sharing a flat with 5 charming, handsome, funny, strong, brave men will do that to you. You’ve lost track of how many times you’ve seen Fox roll up the sleeves of his flannel until they stop just above his tattoos, of how many times Vaughn or Sterling will come home after a long day and immediately rip off their filthy shirts as if they’re still living in the barracks, of the glimpses you’ve caught of Appo when he shaves early in the morning (wearing nothing but his boxers and sleepshirt, no less). Even merely watching Tai at work, watching his hands smooth over the wood or stone or seashells that he carves each day, is enough to send you into a tizzy sometimes.

“Thank you,” he says, and it’s enough to bring you back to the present, away from lingering thoughts of bare skin and strong, broad hands.

You smile as he replaces your bag in its original spot. “Course. At least the day’s almost over, right?”

Tai nods, but doesn’t respond beyond a single grunt. Must be pretty bad. You decide then and there to do something nice for him tonight, tomorrow at the very latest. If not to show how much you care (too much), then to take his mind off the pain.

The opportunity comes in the form of a good dinner for him and his brothers. Food duty is a responsibility shared by all and passed around in a consistent schedule, although there are days when one person is too drained to manage it and someone else takes over. It takes a bit of good-natured arguing and the fluttering of your eyelashes to convince him, but you eventually manage to snag the duty from Tai tonight. He hardly pretends to be relieved.

Sterling had told you once that the food they’d received growing up on Kamino could hardly be classified as such. It was either tasteless slop or ration bars, both packed full of the appropriate nutrients but there was no joy to be found in the eating of it. You’ve made a point since then to note what each brother enjoys best and to accommodate them when you can. Vaughn and Appo seem to like dishes with a bit of kick to them, and it’s helped to expand your own tastes in the process. Fox likes anything sweet, anything that will dribble down his chin and make a mess. You try not to let your mind wander at the thought. Tai’s preference tends to be milder than the others, but he’s been known to be adventurous with his palette every now and then. Sterling, on the other hand, seems keen on anything and everything. He’ll eat just about anything you give him.

It would take far too much time to accommodate each of them tonight, though you’ve done so before. But tonight was meant to be Tai’s night and he’s the one you’re most worried about, so you choose to focus on him this time. A nice plate of roasted fish and vegetables is mellow enough for him while also being filling enough for the other men, and it leaves the whole house smelling delicious.

Fox tells you as much when he comes home. He throws an arm around your shoulders as you eye the timer atop the oven, and you do an amazing job at pretending not to notice how fucking amazing he smells. Even after a long day of manual labor, he still smells a bit like spiced cologne as it mixes with his sweat and natural musk. “Hope you didn’t do all this on my account,” he laughs, all the while wiggling his eyebrows.

“You think too highly of yourself, Fox,” you say, dryly, but there’s a bit of humor in the quirk of your smile.

He makes a big show of being offended, from dramatic exhalations and a hung head, to the resting of his hand over his heart. “I’m hurt, mesh’la.”

You bump his hip with your own, a friendly gesture to get out of the kitchen while you’re still working. “Yeah, yeah, go be hurt somewhere else. And take a shower, you’re all gross.”

The mock salute he offers in response only serves to make your chest literally ache. He’s so kriffing endearing, it kills you.

Sterling and Vaughn come home soon after, each of them looking tired and sweaty after a long day. None of the boys work nearly as hard as Fox does, not physically at least, but their jobs take a lot out of them, and you see it every day. They work long hours, hardly complaining beyond the brotherly banter they spew over beers and shitty holos, and more often than not, their shoulders are slumped, and their shirts stained with sweat and grime. A warm, home-cooked meal is the least you can do. Still, you make a point of serving Tai first.

“I can get it, you know.” His voice is imperceptibly low, and you have to strain yourself to understand him, but you needn’t ask for clarification. You know what he means.

“I know. But you don’t have to.” Tai starts to protest again, even as he starts poking at his food, but you stop him with a shake of your head and a firm expression. “I’m happy to help.”

Even after two years, he still tries to fight you. But this is one battle he’s almost always going to lose, and you hope that one day Tai will come to the understanding that you don’t help him because he’s not capable, but because he deserves some grace. Tonight is just another step toward that finish line.

By the time Appo comes in from his shift, the others are mostly finished eating. They’ve stationed themselves across the living room as they always do, sprawled across the sofa and chairs with their individual serving tables, or just a plate in hand in Fox’s case, balanced before them.

“Go get cleaned up. I kept yours warm.”

He simply nods before heading into the back room and shutting the door behind him. It’s a few minutes later when he comes out, freshly changed, and takes his plate from you mid-serving.

“Sit.”

You shake your head. “No, I got it, just lemme-“

“Sit.”

It’s not said unkindly, although with Appo it’s sometimes hard to tell. The serious lines of his face and the dark pitch of his voice lend themselves to a rather stern and imposing presence. You know him well enough by now, though, and you’ve had the conversation about it before – as much as it may be in your nature, doting on him only makes him feel awkward, and he’d rather you took care of yourself before him or any of his brothers. You still do it sometimes. He makes up for it in his own casual, silent way, and tonight he does it by bringing you a glass of your usual beverage. No shared words, hardly a look spared your way, but a silent understanding that settles between you.

“Anyone else need a karkin’ beer?”

Several sets of eyes slip towards Fox, a few amused, some playfully irritated.

“You’re just sayin’ that ‘cause you’re bored,” Vaughn remarks.

Fox makes an exasperated sound in the back of his throat before throwing himself into the sofa, his empty plate now haphazardly balanced on the cushioned arm. You bite back a comment warning him to be careful for fear of sounding more like his mother than his friend. “No, I’m sayin’ it ‘cause I haven’t had a drink in ages.”

“Careful, vod.” Sterling’s eyes are sparkling mischievously. “You remember what happened last time.”

Ah, yes. Last time. He’d had too much booze and too little food, and ended up doing karaoke at the bar until he got booed off stage. And the only thing that could cheer him up was a bit of friendly flirting and reassurance. From you, of course. Friendly, of course. Not that you still found yourself thinking about that night, or how close he’d been when he asked you if you thought he was pretty. Because you didn’t.

But rather than simmer in his embarrassment, Fox shrugs it off with something of a cocky smile. “That was last time. This time, my belly’s already full. All thanks to our mesh’la.” And he raises his glass of water in a toast to you.

“Mesh’la, smesh’la, I’m not encouraging you.” Rather than sit and be the center of his and his brother’s attention, you push yourself out of your seat and start collecting dishes. “If you wanna go make a fool out of yourself, you’re not roping me into it.” And you truly, deeply hope that none of them can tell you’re lying through your teeth. Because the mere thought of Fox being so close to you again, of whispering all his cheesy one-liners and sweet nothings into your ear, it makes your legs go completely boneless.

The only problem with this is that Fox is, well, Fox. The man could charm the pants off a Gungan if he tried, and you’re honestly not convinced that he hasn’t. So when you approach him and wordlessly reach for his plate, rather than give it to you, he takes your hand in his and he smiles that devilish smile that’s made every life form on the planet melt these past two years. “C’mon,” he whispers. He’s pulled his brows into a pleasant, pleading sort of shape, letting them turn up at the inner corners as he watches you. “It’ll be fun.”

Your throat is suddenly very dry. “You think everything’s fun.”

“’cause it is.”

He’s impossible. He’s an idiot. He’s going to make a fool out of himself again, you’re sure of it. And he’s doing his best to charm you, and it is, unfortunately, working, against your better judgement. “Fox.”

He grins. “Yes?”

“You’re kriffing annoying, you know that?”

His thumb runs semi-circles across the back of your hand, and you swear your brain short circuits. Damn him. “It’s a gift.”

Tai and Sterling elect to stay in for the night. Tai’s nerve pain seems to be flaring up again and Sterling’s hardly a bar-goer, so sticking around for his brother’s sake is much more appealing than a night out with Fox. You’re surprised that Appo decides to come along, though.

“Someone has to keep an eye on that di’kut,” he explains once you ask. “Make sure he doesn’t get himself in trouble.”

Even now that the war is over and their lives as soldiers are far behind them, he refuses to leave his role as commander behind. Not for the first time, you find yourself ruminating on this and the way the realization makes your stomach feel fluttery and your heart feel warm. He’s a good leader, he’s a good brother, and it’s another footnote in your expansive list of why you’ve found yourself falling fast and hard for the brothers of the 501st.

But those are thoughts best left behind on a night like this. You can’t let yourself dwell on it if there’s going to be alcohol, so you push it all as far from your consciousness as possible and choose instead to focus on having fun with your friends, on the pretty lights and mostly good music and the too-sweet flavor of your berry-infused shot.

“-and I was like, ‘no way, the first season is way better than the second!’”

From what you remember, Vaughn’s been caught up in some holo-soap. It’s been taking up a lot of his attention when he’s not working or out painting his murals, but it’s honestly not your thing and you only barely understand what he’s talking about. His brothers, however, don’t seem nearly as lost as you feel.

Fox takes a long swig of his beer and arches his eyebrow incredulously. “You’re just sayin’ that ‘cause you think the actress is hot.”

Vaughn’s attention flickers to you for a moment. He stammers wordlessly for a couple of seconds and you’re sure that if you could see it, he’d be entirely flushed. “Pfft, no. It’s all about the story. Substance, vod. Hotness is secondary.”

Even Appo looks doubtful at that. “Since when?”

He frowns. “Shut up. Neither of you’d know substance if it bit you in the shebs.” To you, he leans in a bit and pretends to lower his voice as if he’s relaying a secret. “Imagine being the only one of your batch with decent taste.”

Despite your earlier dinner, the alcohol has already started to make its way through your blood stream. You’re only buzzed at the moment, but it’s enough to make this otherwise ordinary remark seem outrageously funny, and you end up having to smother your laughter in the crook of your arm.

It’s then that something calls out over the din of the bar.

In all the time you’ve known him, Appo has never been one for grand expressions. He conveys what he needs to in the movement of his eyebrows, the subtlety of his eyes, the tilting of his head, the lilt of his voice. So the moment that he responds to the calling of his name with a wide-eyed, panicked expression and the sudden ramrod straightness of his back, you know that something’s not right.

A yellow-green Nautolan passing by the table, the one that had called his name, claps a hand on his shoulder just as Appo shifts to turn toward him. “That is you!” he exclaims in a smooth, smoky voice. He laughs quite happily, enough that his head tentacles jostle. “It’s been, what, months now?”

“Something like that.”

You’ve never seen him like this before, so unyieldingly stiff and uncomfortable, yet it’s clear he knows this man. Even the others seem unsure what to make of this interaction, though there’s something more than mere uncertainty in the looks Vaughn and Fox are passing each other. They look worried? Anxious?

The Nautolan takes this lull in the conversation to acknowledge the rest of the table. “Sorry to interrupt, fellas, ma’am. Appo ‘n’ me go back a bit, haven’t seen him in forever.”

“Oh, it’s not a problem,” you offer in place of everyone else’s silence.

He extends his hand, and you take it. “Benshar. I hope you haven’t been keeping him from me!”

Appo outwardly cringes, more than you’ve ever seen him do before, not even the last time Fox got plastered. What in the galaxy…?

You absently wonder if there’s some sort of love triangle going on that you’re unaware of, but quickly abandon the thought the moment it comes to you. Sterling and Appo might be of the persuasion of all genders, but Sterling isn’t here and even so, neither of them seem the type to be interested in the same person, let alone allowing themselves to get caught up in that kind of drama. No, something else must be going on.

You smile. “No, no, of course not. But if you two need some time to catch up, we could always-“

“That won’t be necessary.” Appo clears his throat as the attention suddenly falls solely on him. His hand hooks around Benshar’s elbow as he suddenly backs away from the table. “C’mon.” And just like that, he’s gone.

“Okay,” you begin the moment they’re out of earshot, “what the hell was that?”

Vaughn downs the rest of his drink. Fox takes a ridiculously long swig. Neither of them audibly speaks, but they’re very clearly communicating to each other in a way only clones seem to understand. You doubt you’ll ever be able to master the subtle cues they’ve spent a solid decade practicing, but it does leave you out of the loop this time, the one time it really matters.

“Guys, I’m not stupid. Clearly that was something. What is it?”

A few seconds pass before Vaughn shifts uncomfortably. “Old flame.” He refuses to look you in the eye.

It takes a minute, but it hits you like a ton of duracrete. Of course. Of course. You’d thought about it before, wondered how a group of five handsome and very capable young men could go two whole years without any kind of sex life. There have been isolated incidents in the past where you’d wake up in the middle of the night because you thought you’d heard something in the adjoining room, or a muffled grunt or two coming from the shower early in the morning, but not once have they ever asked to bring somebody home. Not once have you ever seen them kiss another being. You know they feel attraction because they joke about it enough, because Appo and Sterling have both referenced previous encounters. And you know Fox has gotten laid several times since coming to Aurea – how could he not? he’d flirt with a tree if it would flirt back with him – but he’s never bragged about it in your presence, never rubbed it in like salt in his brothers’ wounds. But somehow, you’d thought, you’d hoped that it was because maybe… maybe that unspoken feeling that sits deep in your heart isn’t as one-sided as you’ve always known it to be.

It’s a foolish hope. It’s stupid to think a single one of these men could ever want you in the way that you want them. Surely they’d have made a move by now if they did. But Maker, it hurts. It hurts to know that someone else on this planet has known the taste of Appo’s lips, has heard him sigh and moan, has probably taken him out on dates and showered him in affection, and it hurts that that someone isn’t you. You watch Fox for a bit, trail your eyes along his tattoos, then to Vaughn and the puckered scar in his cheek, and it’s like a vibroblade to your heart. Someone who isn’t you has known them as well, has felt the touch of their skin, their lips, has felt their love.

“So he was flirting. That guy.” It comes out unbidden and a touch more bitter than you mean it to.

Vaughn snorts. “Not very well.”

And you know you shouldn’t say it, really, you do. You know it reveals too much, you know it should embarrass you, but you know if you don’t, you’ll burst. You eyeball your empty shot glass, tongue tucked into your cheek, and shake your head with a humorless laugh. “I need another drink.”

The whole walk to the bar, the whole conversation with the server, the entire wait, and the whole walk back, it’s all you think about – people have known these men, your men, and those people weren’t you. There could be any number of reasons why, they might respect you too much, they might not want to lose out on a good flat if things went south with you, they might want things they feel you can’t give them, and every reason is understandable, but all you can feel is that they went searching for love and pleasure and it never occurred to them to come find you. It’s stupid, really, because it’s not like they owe it to you. It’s not like you’ve ever made your feelings clear beyond a few isolated, innocent comments made in a clearly friendly setting, something meant to be seen as either a compliment or a joke and nothing more.

You’re intoxicated, you finally decide, and that’s the reason it hurts so much. Best thing to do is just drown it out and hope it goes away. You know it won’t, but it’s better than wallowing in your misery. Probably.

You down one shot when you return to the table, but there’s still the massive stein of liquor, one of the brands on the stronger end of the spectrum of what you can handle. Both men eye you warily when you start drinking and you know they have every right to because it’s obvious that you’re not yourself right now.

“What?” They don’t say anything, but the judgement is clear. “Oh please, it’s not like I’m gonna pull a Fox. ‘sides, I’m gonna need something stronger if we’re gonna start talking about our love lives.”

“You okay?” Vaughn asks. He tacks your name onto the end when you shrug him off. “I’m serious. You good?”

“Course I am!” And it’s a bit too cheery, too fake, too not-you. It has to be to keep the tears at bay.

They share another look, and it just adds insult to injury to know that they don’t trust you. Or maybe those shots are running through you quicker than you thought they would.

“Okay. Who else is seeing someone and didn’t tell me? Fox?”

He splutters disbelievingly at the accusation. “Why’re you lookin’ at me?”

“’cause you’re a flirt, Fox. But that’s okay, it’s part of your charm. I’m just surprised I haven’t walked in on you and some pretty Twi’lek in our shower, to be honest.”

Shut up. Shut up, shut up, just stop! Talking! That’s the logical part of your brain, the sober part that’s going down kicking and screaming. The liquor is loosening your tongue, and the angst is coloring it all a distinct shade of envy. It doesn’t occur to you that Fox might take offense, or that you’re the one making a fool of yourself this time, not him, not when all you can feel is the incredible pain of longing for something that was never even yours.

Vaughn’s hand comes into view then, his fingers wrapping around the circumference of your stein to gently tug it back onto the table. “Hey.” He’s gentle, strong. “Why don’t you drink some water first?”

“I’m fine.” You’re not so far gone that you don’t understand what he’s suggesting. “I’m not drunk.” But you’re getting there. “What about you? You been seeing anyone and keeping it a secret?”

His brows are deeply furrowed as he considers you. “Why?”

“Well, ‘cause clearly everyone in the flat can get some except for me!”

Funny how that’s not what you’d meant to say. Funny how it’s still so true. You think about that pretty Nautolan and how excited he was to see Appo, despite Appo’s obvious discomfort, and you feel your entire body shrink in on itself.

“Doesn’t matter,” you finally say. “I’m happy you guys can find that if you need it.” You’re happy because you want them to be happy. Doesn’t mean it’s not killing you inside. “Just wish I could find it, too.”

The bar suddenly feels too loud and too warm, overcrowded and greasy and uncomfortable even though nothing has changed from this moment and the last. Maybe it’s the weight of Fox and Vaughn’s attention, maybe it’s the weight of feeling so startlingly alone when mere minutes ago you felt as though you had the best family in the galaxy.

“Is that what this is about?” You look up from the intricate wood grain of the table and into Fox’s eyes. Maker, those big, brown eyes. They all have the same ones. So beautiful, so dark and endless. “You lonely, mesh’la?”

“No,” but your face is clearly saying yes.

“Nothing wrong with being lonely. We’ve all been there. Tell you what,” and he shifts closer to you so that your shoulders are pressing together and some of his heat comes over you. If this is the most you’ll ever get, then you’ll take it and run with it. “We’ll help you snag someone, yeah? How about him, over there?”

Following the line of his arm to one of the other tables, you see a handsome young man with a gorgeous head of curly hair, dark skin, and a nose ring. He has a nice laugh and a tall, lithe build.

“Bet he’d treat you good.”

“Vod.” You don’t dare to read into the irritation in Vaughn’s voice, but you let yourself imagine for a moment what it would be like if he were jealous.

His brother ignores him. “Or him.” Another person is pointed out to you, a Pantoran with broad shoulders and a bit of stubble. He’s handsome enough, but his build instantly reminds you of Fox, so you shake your head. “Alright, you pick someone and we’ll make it happen.”

“’We’?” Vaughn scoffs. “Don’t bring me into this one, mate.”

Pick someone. He doesn’t even realize how dangerous that offer is. Three of your first five picks are already in the building.

“Don’t think that’s a good idea,” you tell him after mulling the idea over. Another swig of alcohol pools in your belly. “You might not like who I pick out.”

“Your taste is that bad, huh?”

“Oh yeah. Tall, dark, and handsome. It’s a fucking curse.”

Fox’s eyes darken for a moment, as if something’s occurred to him that he knows he ought not repeat. But then comes that smirk, the one that curls up in the corner of his mouth and makes your head feel light, the one he only ever gets when he’s acting like an absolute menace. “Tall, dark, and handsome. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were talkin’ about me.”

Vaughn damn near jumps across the table. “Fox!”

With his eyes still caught on you, Fox huffs. “Kriff off, Vaughn.”

You take a quick sip of your drink, careful and slow so as not to spill, before giving your answer. “I was.” It comes with its own smirk.

You’ve heard that time travel isn’t really plausible. It happens in small amounts when travelling great distances, when going off-world, but such events are so common nowadays that no one really thinks about it too hard. The computers do most of the thinking for you, anyways. But here in this shitty little bar on this mediocre little trade planet, lightyears away from anything truly important in the galaxy, you feel as though time has slowed itself just for you.

You swore you’d never say anything. You promised yourself you’d never let yourself go down this road. You and Fox have something of a platonically flirty friendship, but there are boundaries neither of you have ever crossed. This moment right here, the subtle glimmer of desire in his eyes, the way you’re gazing up through your lashes at him, the outright admittance that yes, he is handsome and yes, you’ve always known it, none of it is friendly and you both know it.

“Your taste can’t be that bad if I’m on the list.”

You shrug nonchalantly, as if your heart isn’t about to beat right out of your chest. “It’s not a long list.”

“Oh? Care to share?”

You could lay it all on the table now. He’s egging you on, he clearly wants to know, and Maker knows you want to tell him. You want every single one of them to know that you harbor feelings for them and that those feelings run deep. You want them to know because maybe, just maybe, if you bat your eyes and tilt your head just right and they consider even looking your way, they’ll see what they’ve been missing out on, what’s been missing them for all this time. That maybe one of them will have an ‘aha!’ moment and realize that you’re everything he ever needed. It’s desperate. It’s embarrassing. But in this moment, that’s all you really are. A lonely girl with her lonely heart, desperate for one of the men she’s fallen for to see her as she is.

One of your hands drifts in Fox’s direction then, almost of its own accord. You play with the idea of touching the rolled-up hem of his sleeve, but ultimately settled for hovering your hand over it instead. “I don’t know. You got any old flames that haunt this bar? I’d hate to put my heart on my sleeve just for some pretty thing to come along and squash it.”

You’re not sure what you were expecting him to do in response, but leaning further into your space, letting his forearm fill the curve of your palm and his cologne wash over you? Ducking his head down to smile at you as if you’re the only person in the galaxy he has eyes for? It’s almost too much to hope for.

His voice is hoarse when he speaks. “Don’t be a tease, baby. You got somethin’ to say? Let’s hear it.”

This can’t be real. You’re imagining it? You’re so drunk that you’re making shit up. For surely it’s not Fox who’s flirting with you and meaning every word, who’s crowding you up against the edge of the table and making you feel so small in the best possible way. But then he sighs, and his breath hits your face, and your eyes flutter shut. Somewhere in the background, you can hear Vaughn talking, but none of the words are getting through to you. It’s all just white noise.

“Your list, mesh’la. I wanna hear it.”

“Short list,” you whisper, even though you’ve already said it. “Only five names.”

His burning eyes dip below your nose and you swear you see into another dimension at the implication.

“What the hell is going on here?”

It doesn’t fully register to you that the voice isn’t Fox’s, not at first. They are, after all, clones. The whole point is that they’re identical to each other. It takes Fox moving away and the awkward silence and coolness that he leaves in his wake for you to catch up. He never moved his mouth, did he? That’s when you see Appo.

The mock salute you give him only worsens the lines of his frown. “Commander. Have fun with your boyfriend?”

He studies you in the time it takes you to remember how to breathe and then take another drink. He scowls. “You’re drunk.”

“Not fully, but getting there.” The accompanying finger guns don’t sell him on the idea like you thought they would. “We missed you.”

The scowl morphs into a sneer, and it’s practically murderous. “Didn’t look it to me.” To Fox, he starts, “Take her home. Before I decide to kick your shebs.”

And doesn’t that just burn? He’s so angered at the thought of you being close to his brother, so irritated at the thought of you finding a bit of joy, that he wants you gone? If you were anywhere near any form of logical thinking, you might be able to see this for what it is. But instead of fact, your spotchka-addled brain weaves a brand of fiction so bizarre that it only makes sense to you.

“Want me out of the way so you can canoodle with your boyfriend, Appo?”

His face snaps towards yours, his eyes so wide that you’re almost worried they’ll pop out of his head, but it seems the comment has left him speechless. Good, more room for you to dig your grave.

“You don’t have to hide it, you know. I’m a big girl, I can handle it.” Liar. This whole evening is proof of exactly the opposite.

His hand flexes at his side. Maker, he looks angry. It shouldn’t tickle you the way it does, yet you can’t help reveling in it. He broke your heart just now. Drunken logic dictates that he should feel just as horrible as you.

Rather than deign you with any kind of response, though, Appo chooses to leave. Sober you will thank the stars for this, but in this moment all you feel is the cleaving of a blade through your heart, another confirmation that Appo is lost to you, that all of them are lost to you. There’s no more fight left after that.

Fox takes care of the bill and the table while Vaughn escorts you outside. They both help you into the land speeder – Appo’s speeder – and they take you home.

“You’re on the list, you know. All of you.” And as you stare up at Vaughn from beneath your lashes, hoping against hope, burning every last bridge of friendship you’ve built, you think that he’s the most beautiful man you’ve ever met. You press your palm into the swell of his chest, where he’s warm and muscled under the flap of his leather jacket, and you cry. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to fall in love with you.”

You don’t remember anything after that.

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