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stairset · 6 years

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Since the series finale is coming up I wanna talk about all my absolute favorite Rebels episodes, in the order they aired bc ranking them would be so hard and I'm lazy, and why I love them because I feel like I owe it to a show that's been a huge part of my life for the last few years and was one of the things that got me through the nightmare that is the teenage years.

Rise of the Old Masters: I think every good show has that one great episode early on that just tells you "this is gonna be a good show, we have a plan" and gets you hooked, and I believe this was that episode for Rebels. Spark of Rebellion was a solid start, Droids in Distress and Fighter Flight were slower episodes to help you get to know the characters a bit more, and then this episode is, for lack of a better term, when shit started getting real. Ezra and Kanan's relationship starts developing, the Grand Inquisitor is introduced in person and makes a great first impression, we get some of our first major Clone Wars connections, etc. It also uses Yoda's famous "do or do not" line to deliver a nice message. "I'm not gonna TRY to teach you anymore. If all I do is try, that means I don't truly believe I can succeed, so from now on, I WILL teach you".

Path of the Jedi: Once again, Kanan and Ezra both have a lot of development here, both as a team and as individuals. The crazy visions that Ezra experiences were some of the darkest and most intense things in the show at the time, and Frank Oz guest appearing as Yoda's voice and Ezra finally constructing his own lightsaber are both great crowd pleasing moments. It also happens to be the first appearance of the world between worlds, though neither Ezra or the audience realized it at the time, which just goes to show how far back the writers planned everything out.

Call To Action: Tarkin makes his debut and calls out our other villains on their relative incompetence throughout the season, even going so far as to, erm, make an example of two of them, and succeeds where they have failed, even capturing Kanan in the process. Despite the cliffhanger, it's a bittersweet ending as the crew does succeed in their mission to deliver a message of hope to Lothal and the surrounding systems. This is where the stakes start to raise, and it shows.

Fire Across the Galaxy: Ending the first season with a bang, the crew rescues Kanan on Tarkin's star destroyer above Mustafar, the stolen TIE from Fighter Flight actually ends up being relevant, the Grand Inquisitor is sent off in the perfect way, the crew joins with Pheonix Squadron, giving us our earliest look at the growing rebellion, and of course the moment everyone remembers, the reintroduction to Ahsoka Tano, and her former master not long after. It was the perfect way to end the first season while getting everyone hyped for the next.

The Siege of Lothal: Everyone was absolutely hyped for the season 2 premiere and it did not disappoint. While many worried that Vader would be toned down for the show, he proved to be as threatening as ever, outsmarting our heroes time and again, kicking Kanan and Ezra's asses, and putting his pilot skills to use by taking on the entirety of Pheonix Squadron himself. And of course there's the unforgettable scene where he and Ahsoka sense each other and James Earl Jones delivers the iconic, bone chilling line "the apprentice lives".

Stealth Strike: This episode was just fun, plain and simple. Kanan and Rex's bickering, Ezra's interactions with Sato, it was all hilarious and entertaining. It was sweet seeing Kanan and Rex finally start getting along, and it also happens to be one of the few times Commander Sato played a major role in an episode. Despite Sato's fairly minor role in the show I always liked him, so seeing him in the action with the lead characters was nice.

The Future of the Force: The Inquisitors are after force sensitive children to ensure that they don't grow up to become Jedi, and it's up to Ezra, Kanan, Zeb and Ahsoka to stop them. Kanan, Ezra and Zeb having to get out of the apartment building with the Inquisitors hot on their trail was intense and lead to an entertaining chase through town, and it all culminated in the elic fight between Ahsoka and the Inquisitors where we see her brandish her white lightsabers for the first time. The episode also serves as a bit of a continuation of the Clone Wars season 2 premiere, in which Sidious hires Cad Bane to help carry out a very similar plot.

Legacy: The episode starts off intense with the Empire attacking the Rebels at their current location after Ezra accidentally gave it away in the previous episode, while the rest is much slower, as Ezra follows a trail of force breadcrumbs to Ryder Azadi, from whom he finally learns the tragic fate of his parents. I think I speak for a lot of people when I expected him to reunite with them, so the revelation of their deaths was a bit of a shocker, and Ezra's reaction, his vison of being with them on a better Lothal, and Kanan's statement that they'll live on in him were all beautifully tearjerking.

Shroud of Darkness: Even though this episode basically exists for the purpose of setting up the season finale, it still stands on its own as a fan favorite, and rightfully so. Our Jedi Trio of Ezra, Kanan and Ahsoka see lots of cool, trippy visions in the Lothal temple, including the Grand Inquisitor and the revelation of his backstory, the return of Frank Oz as Yoda (this time face to face), and of course Ahsoka getting confirmation that Vader really is her old master, with Matt Lanter reprising his role. The episode also has a number of iconic shots, including the temple guard avatars surrounding the Inquisitors, Ahsoka seeing Yoda in an homage to The Last Crusade, and Vader entering the Lothal temple at the end to meet with his Inquisitors in person.

Thhe Mystery of Chopper Base: A rather straight forward adventure, featuring the crew having to rescue Rex from some creepy ass spider creatures. Like Stealth Strike, this episode is simply fun. It's got so many great interactions between our main crew. But there's also a lingering feeling of dread throughout because, because you know there gonna be separated soon and that something's gonna go wrong because, well, it's Star Wars. It leads into the season finale perfectly.

Twilight of the Apprentice: We all remember this one. We all remember our exact reactions to everything in it. Maul is introduced, Ezra starts being tempted by the dark side, the Inquisitors are all killed off, Kanan is blided, and of course Ahsoka and Vader have their climactic duel that was built up for the whole season and did not disappoint, and the last minute or so simply showing the aftermath of everything that happened as “It’s All Over” plays is so effective with absolutely no dialogue. Not only that, but, and I’ve said this before, this episode is also the point where all the big parts of the timeline directly come together. In this episode, Rebels, Clone Wars, the prequels, the originals and even the sequels are all directly connected in a way that they never were before, and it’s not until a later episode that they’re all connected on that same level again. This episode, and subsequently the whole show, is the fulcrum of the Star Wars saga.

The Holocrons of Fate: Maul makes his return and has his sights set on both the Sith holocron from Malachor and Kanan’s Jedi holocron so that he can combine their power to learn any knowledge he desires. This leads to our mind-blowing climax in which Maul learns through the light of the holocrons that Obi-wan is still alive and sets off to find him, while Ezra sees a vision of twin suns, also pointing to Obi-wan, albeit in a less direct way. While the whole episode is entertaining the ending is truly what sets its place as one of the best simply because of the epic factor.

The Last Battle: This episode is simply a half hour of pure unadultered Clone Wars nostalgia and I loved every goddamn second of it. Everything from the battle of Christophsis soundtrack to the return of the droid humor from tcw to General Kalani from the Onderon arc being there to the heroes having to team up with the droids thanks to Ezra being the voice of reason and making them realize they were all just pawns for Palpatine and he is their true enemy, and the yellow Clone Wars style title card at the end with the Clone Wars theme playing during the credits, it’s just a giant love letter to the entire Clone Wars fanbase, a thank you for helping the crew get where they are today. It shows how much they truly appreciate their fans, which shouldn’t be a rare thing with content creators but it is.

An Inside Man: I have a sorta complicated relationship with Agent Kallus, who I guess isn’t an agent anymore but that’s beside the point. I don’t like him that much as I feel his redemption arc could’ve been handled much better and he could’ve done more to earn it, which I’ve talked about before. Yet despite this, I love not only this episode but another Kallus centered episode later on that I’ll get to. This whole episode is intense and excited. Mister Sumar, a minor character from season 1, is reintroduced only to be brutally killed by Thrawn, seeting the stakes for the episode, and establishing Thrawn as an effective villain. While Thrawn’s episodes before this one were more about him simply studying the heroes from behind the scenes, this is the point where he starts taking direct action against the heroes, and does it damn well. He figures out all their tricks that all the Imperials before him overlooked, and Kanan and Ezra only barely get out.

Visions and Voices: Maul returns once again to finish his mind connection with Ezra, leading to the return to Dathomir where the ghosts of the Nightsisters serve as the Guest Appearance Of The Week and posess Kanan and Sabine in rather creepy ways, Ezra also discovers Obi-wan is alive while Maul finds out where he’s hiding, and of course Sabine gets her hands on the darksaber. Like Shroud of Darkness this episode exists just to set up a climactic fight in a later episode, but still stands on it’s own.

Trials of the Darksaber/Legacy of Mandalore: I put these together because they’re basically a two-parter and because I love them for largely the same reasons. These were the first Sabine episodes where she finally got some real, major development as a character. Previous Sabine centered episode seemed to all follow the pattern of “have some dialogue hinting at her backstory that we give away in the sneak peeks then no other answers” and it was frustrating because beyond that those episodes were solid episode, but the way they kept promoting them to be bigger than they were did effect my enjoyment of them at the time. These episode finally resolve that problem and give us payoff to all those hints, and boy was that payoff satisfying. We get the backstory of the darksaber, Sabine training, we’re finally introduced to her family, and the final battle between Sabine and Gar Saxon is simply epic.

Through Imperial Eyes: This is the other Kallus episode that I love despite my “meh” opinion of the character. The banter between Kallus and Ezra is very entertaining to watch, Kallus’s plan for framing Liste as the traitor to keep his cover is very clever, though obviously not clever enough to fool Thrawn, who once again proves to be a great villain and shows that he can hold his own in a physical fight, and of course Yularen appearing was cool.

Twin Suns: The long awaited final showdown between Obi-wan and Maul, who actually finally dies for good, like is really, seriously, legit, for real, in actuality, finally permanently dead, deceased, lifeless, killed, devoid of life, sleeping with the fishes, an ex-person. At first I was in the crowd of people who were like “what the fuck” at how quick he went out, but in analysis I wouldn’t have it any other way. It shows how much Obi-wan has wisened over the years whereas Maul never learned, never changed, and tried the same thing he did on Qui-Gon, and it proved to be his final downfall. The way Obi-wan holds Maul’s body in his arms the same way he did with both Qui-Gon and Satine so many years before, and shows sadness and pity that it couldn’t have turned out differently is absolutely beautiful and heartbreaking. The cartoons made Maul such an interesting character, and cemented him as one of my favorite villains, and I couldn’t ask for a better conclusion to this decades old rivalry.

Zero Hour: While not as mind blowing as the previous season’s finale, Zero Hour is still and intense and action packed way to conclude the season. We see the end of Pheonix Squadron and the beginnings of then true Rebel Alliance, Sato gets an epic and heroic send off, the fight in space with Ezra and the Mandos is epic, the Bendu gives us a glimpse of his true power, and Thrawn is as great a villain as ever. The whole thing is simply epic.

In The Name of the Rebellion: We finally saw the Rebel Alliance on Yavin 4 in all its glory, Saw makes a return and, as I said when the episodes first aired, I believe the Moral Ambiguity with his character, while still not perfect, was handled better here than in Ghosts of Geonosis, but i don’t feel like repeating myself so just look the post up if you haven’t read it already. Anyway Saw’s interactions with Ezra and Sabine were a lot of fun to watch, like if we’re still giving everyone space fmaily nicknames then Saw is like the slightly crazed but still kinda cool uncle in this episode. All the connections to Rogue One were a ton of fun to piece together, and it was great to finally see a giant kyber crystal that’s actually fully animated. Also Jennifer Hale was in it so that’s pretty neat.

Flight of the Defender: A very simple and straight forward episode. Ezra and Sabine steal the TIE defender prototype, they crash it and hide the hyperdrive, we meet the white lothwolf who helps them get back to their friends. I can’t even really explain why I like this one so much tbh, but I do.

Jedi Night/DUMJE: We all know why these episodes are here. I couldn’t ask for a more epic and heartbreaking send off for Kanan’s character, and I’m glad that they dedicated the entire following episode to showing how the rest of the cast deals with their grief in different way rather than glossing over it and immediately moving on to the Mortis stuff. It’s surprisingly rare for characters to get to properly grieve in this franchise despite death being so common. Obi-wan, Galen, Han, Luke, the entire population of Alderaan, the other characters have to get over these things pretty quickly so it’s nice to see a more realistic aftermath for once.

Wolves and a Door/A World Between Worlds: I’ve made my thoughts on these episodes very clear since they aired on Monday, which is that they are quite possibly the most mind blowing thing I’ve watched in a very long time. The connections to Mortis and callbacks to all the movies and to Clone Wars, the voices in the background, the beautifully animated moving pictures, the return of Ahsoka and the revelation of what happened to her, Sidious making his debute with Ian McDiarmid himself providing the voice, it’s all incredible to watch. Like I said about Twilight of the Apprentice, this episode is one of the few times where we get an idea of just how connected everything really is, that it’s all one big story. No wonder the two episodes are also so tightly connected to each other, they truly are where all the parts of the saga come together in ways they never could otherwise.

#this is quite possibly the longest post ive ever made im just. so passionate about this show ok #its so important to me i just had to make a big huge analysis about why i love it so much #im gonna miss it so much but im glad its gonna get the proper ending it deserves #instead of getting canned while still in its prime like tcw #star wars rebels #shut up tristan

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cinna-wanroll · 4 years

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Obi-Wan’s Unusual Behaviors Towards Satine Kryze

Ft. 2am character analysis notes

Obi-Wan Kenobi is hardly a people-pleaser. In fact, it is speculated in Wild Space that he may never have told a single flattering lie in his entire life. Prime examples of this trait would be in the TCW movie, where he has tea and friendly banter with the enemy general- he even winks at his opponent. He unashamedly flirts with Sith assassin Asajj Ventress multiple times throughout the series- even in front of others. He lets himself lose terribly in a fight during the Kadavo arc to buy Anakin and Ahsoka time, and constantly makes snarky/sarcastic commentary. He can be rather blunt, and isn’t afraid to contradict other people’s ideas, views, or tactics. He does this with Anakin throughout the series, with Count Dooku in the Dooku Captured arc, and even with Captain Tarkin in the Citadel arc. All in all, Obi-Wan is a confident man who doesn’t let the judgments of others affect the way he operates.

That is, until mid-season two.

Why, Cinna? You ask, voice full of curiosity. You have no idea where this is going. You’re on the edge of your seat, waiting for me to tell you. Are you ready? Do you wanna know? I’ll give you one hint- I never shut up about her.

Yes ladies and gentleman, I’m talking about Satine Kryze.

You gasp, shocked.

When she shows up, Obi-Wan suddenly displays multiple uncharacteristic habits. He constantly touches her, constantly checks to be sure she’s safe- which shows doubts in his own abilities as a protector, and he even seeks affirmations of friendship from her.

He isn’t afraid to look into her eyes, but is shy at some moments, which we almost never see from him in any situation, ever, unless he’s being touched. See: the moment he’s being hugged by a Talz.

Examples of his shyness around Satine would be the way he looks down after she teases him about falling and dropping her, or when she comments about his beard ‘hiding too much of his handsome face.’ He doesn’t instantly make a snarky or light-hearted comment back to her gentle teasing here like he normally would, instead he asks her seriously why she doesn’t like it.

“Why? What’s wrong with it?”

Although I would like to note he never truly looses his Obi-Wan characteristics here- he doesn’t shave after she makes the comment, but his questions show that he cares not just about what she thinks of him as a person, but physically as well.

This adds a softer, sweeter side to the Jedi Master/ my husband, and is an indicator of a difference to all of his other relationships. Upon further analyzation, I have broken Obi-Wan’s stages of relationships into six stages of companionship.

Stage 1- Puts up walls, distant, stiff, snarky/witty, deflective, non-emotional, sometimes chiding. An example of someone in this category might be Sugi, from the Trouble on Felucia arc. (although I mean there is some sexual tension there, its probably because shes also played by Anna Graves who plays Satine, but-)

Stage 2- Friendly, cheerful, lets his guard down a little. Dex would probably fall under this section.

Stage 3- Still a little distant but will show he cares about you in some ways. Will defend you. This is probably where all his work friends go- Yoda, Mace, etc.

Stage 4- Listens to you, checks on you, jokes with you, will give you advice. Ahsoka is a good example of someone in this category.

Stage 5- Basically Anakin. Will confess his flaws and internal struggles.

Stage 6- Satine Kryze. Cares about what you think. Probably thinks about making out with you a lot.

Now there is another important component of their relationship to discuss- their PDONAs, or public displays of non-affection.

The over-the-top argument on The Coronet in front of the senators is a perfect example of this. While Obitine may butt heads on occasion alone, their squabbles are usually tedious and are centered around one thing: tension.

Whether it’s the tension of a dangerous situation, physical attraction, or things left unsaid, they take every opportunity to deny their tensions to both one other and themselves. This of course is aided by their intellectual and stubborn personalities, however their private disagreements are a lot more about their concern for one another than they are grandiose like the aforementioned Coronet argument. A good example of this is when Obi-Wan responds to Satine’s comment on him hurting people by fretting:

“You don’t seem troubled that I could’ve been killed back there.”

Obi-Wan could have said so many different things to counter what Satine said, like ‘Would you have preferred I stood by while they ground me/you to bits?’ But no, instead he very directly asks the question, ‘don’t you care about me?’

This is the heart of their personal arguments. However in public, not only are they trying to convince themselves they aren’t in love- they also have an audience. And since they are both stubborn, passionate, and very extra, things explode.

Obi-Wan isn’t really disputing Satine’s beliefs- he’s known about her political views since they were young. So the argument they’re having only makes sense to me as a young Obitine argument. No, he’s convincing those around him that he could never be with her because they have different interests.

Satine doesn’t think Obi-Wan is war-hungry, she knows that he’s almost as dedicated to peace as she is, and she’s intelligent enough to understand he just has a different opinion on how peace is achieved in the first place. So when she is accusing him of such things, she is attempting to erase their history and understanding so that their audience won’t know what is going on between them or what went on between them.

In that episode (Voyage of Temptation) the inner turmoil felt by both Obi-Wan and Satine is palpable, and driven by the rekindled emotions which were never properly burnt out- only unhealthily buried by two emotionally constipated and overly-responsible young people.

Their desires are coming to the surface after all these years of repression faster than either of them knows how to deal with. So, they attempt old methods of burying their emotions from when they were apart- i.e. convincing themselves they are too different, they have different goals, one of them is incompetent, etc. Except no it’s not just themselves they are dealing with, and the truth is in front of their faces so it’s harder to deny their chemistry and compatibility.

This eventually dissolves into Obi-Wan becoming more physical with Satine, constantly needing to be around her and not being able to get her out of his mind.

He is seen watching her defend her world when he’s admitted to disliking politics and has different views. He attempts to comfort her afterwards, even running to catch up with her and grabbing her arm, then later attempting to grab her hand. He seeks her out after she’s been avoiding him to make sure she’s okay and when she says she “didn’t want to worry him,” he replies, “on that count, I’m afraid you failed spectacularly.”

He doesn’t say, ‘Well, I was,’ or even ‘on that count, you failed.’

No, he adds spectacularly, which shows that most likely all he’s been doing is worrying about her. He grabs her by the shoulders and leans his face in way too unnecessarily close just to talk with her.

He’s shown gazing out the window worriedly while Satine is on the run. He stares at her (which is technically putting her in more danger the longer he waits!) just to watch her and how good she looks in her disguise. He even smiles like a fool at her. He only comes to his senses when police pass by. He sits with his hands close to hers and then when he’s about to enter the senate building he looks back to make sure she’s okay.

They both touch each other like crazy in every episode, and as I mentioned before, Obi-Wan has expressed how uncomfortable he is with physicality, which shows how comfortable and trusting he is around and of Satine.

In conclusion: Obi-Wan is soft for Satine.

#obitine #obi wan kenobi #satine kryze #obi wan x satine #star wars #tcw

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bedlamsbard · 5 years

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The Ahsoka and Caleb adventure concept! This is a little different from the concepts I usually post because I would like to turn it into a full story someday, but don’t know when or if that’s going to happen, especially because I’ve been sitting on it for a while. (Thus the mid-scene ending.) Set during TCW S5 sometime.

About 1800 words below the break.

Returning to Coruscant and the Jedi Temple was always soothing, especially when it came with the promise of a week’s furlough before they were deployed again. Anakin had vanished almost as soon as they had set foot dirtside, which was fine as far as Ahsoka was concerned. She’d gotten dinner from the kitchens – real food, and not just ration cubes that were formulated for humans but were technically supposed to be nutritious for many different species, Togruta among them – and then a bath, before falling into bed for a full night’s sleep. A bed. With sheets. She had still woken up at the crack of dawn, expecting the sound of a military camp coming to life before remembering where she was. Without anyone to tell her otherwise, she had lolled around in bed for another hour before finally getting up and heading down to the dining hall, blissfully considering the breakfast choices as she got herself a tray. No ration cubes here, that was for sure.

Without anything to interrupt her – like a Separatist attack, for example, or Anakin and Obi-Wan helpfully popping up out of nowhere with a set of new drills for her to run – Ahsoka applied herself to her breakfast and ate her way through two glorious servings, settling back with a cup of steaming kerami juice and a bowl of cut fruit to finally take stock of the room.

It was still early, but there were far fewer people about than she had expected. Most padawans were in the field, of course, which probably accounted for the majority of the absences – prior to the war at least half of them would have been here, still taking advanced classes in the Temple between assignments with their masters. But the number of initiates and younglings seemed far too low as well; Ahsoka abruptly remembered a conversation she had overheard between Master Obi-Wan and Master Plo, discussing the drop in new younglings. There simply seemed to be far fewer Force-sensitive children in the galaxy than there had been two decades earlier, a number that had peaked with Obi-Wan’s generation and then dropped sharply after Anakin’s. Since only a tenth of a percentage of already rare Force-sensitives were strong enough to potentially become Jedi, that meant that cohorts in the past decade and a half were the smallest in recorded history, many including fewer than half a dozen younglings.

Ahsoka hadn’t thought anything of it at the time. As far as she was concerned, that was just the way things were. But now, looking at the mostly empty dining hall – built for the Jedi Order in its prime – the shock of it struck her. Jedi were dying in the dozens in this war, and the Force wasn’t producing enough new Jedi to replace them. It went against everything she had ever been taught about the Force.

“Padawan Tano?” a shy voice said from her other side, and Ahsoka turned to find a youngling standing there, a human boy a few years younger than her with amber-dark skin, thick brown hair, and striking blue-green eyes. No lightsaber on his belt; he hadn’t gone on his Gathering yet.

“That’s me,” she said. “And you are –” She didn’t know as many of the younglings as she would like, not having been at the Temple very often in the past few years.

“Dume.”

Ahsoka blinked, wondering if she had misheard him. “Doom?” Precognition? she thought an instant later, wary. It was a fairly common wild talent, though from what she had heard strong precognitives tended to be extremely precocious. Prophesying destruction in the dining hall seemed like it would qualify for that. “The doom of what?” The Jedi? The Confederacy? The Republic? The Sith?

The corner of the boy’s mouth twitched a little. “Dume is my name,” he said, and this time she heard the very slight difference in pronunciation. “I’m Caleb Dume.”

“Oh,” Ahsoka said, a little embarrassed. “Um – what can I do for you, Caleb?”

He glanced self-consciously over his shoulder; a little ways down the long table Ahsoka saw two more younglings watching them, a dark-skinned human girl and a blue-skinned Twi’lek boy. Small cohorts, she thought again, with a chill that had nothing to do with the room’s temperature. Three was a very small cohort; hers had at least been closer to ten than five, though not all of them were still alive. And these younglings weren’t much younger than her.

“Are you doing anything today?” he asked in a rush. “Anything important, I mean?”

“Not unless my master wants me,” Ahsoka said, “which he probably won’t.” Given how quickly Anakin had left the shipyards, Ahsoka wasn’t expecting to see him before their furlough was up – unless of course bounty hunters attacked the Temple or the Separatists stole a march on them somewhere or someone tried to assassinate Senator Amidala again.

Well, in that case, Ahsoka probably still wouldn’t see him.

“Why?” she added, studying the boy. She could feel the bright purl of power in him; he was very strong with the Force even for a Jedi, and there was something about him that reminded her a little of both Anakin and Obi-Wan, a sense that for lack of anything better she called destiny. She wasn’t going to tell anyone else that, though.

The boy hesitated briefly, then decided to forge on. “I want to go down into the city,” he said, “but we’re not allowed out of the Temple by ourselves. And all the masters here are busy.”

Ahsoka stared at him. “What do you want to see in the city?”

He looked at her with deadly seriousness. “A shadow.”

Ahsoka’s disbelief must have shown on her face, because Caleb bristled a little and said, “It’s true!”

“It’s not,” said the human girl, coming up behind him along with the Twi’lek. “The kid’s hallucinating and thinking he’s having visions again.”

“I don’t think I have visions!” he snapped at her. “And don’t call me kid!” He took a breath with the obvious intent to calm himself, then turned his back on his cohortmates so that he was looking at Ahsoka again.

Ahsoka always had trouble with humans, but Twi’lek ages were a little easier for her to judge, and she thought cautiously that Caleb was younger than his two companions; most cohorts were made up of younglings around the same age since they entered the Temple at the same time, but occasionally you got one who was substantially younger. Mostly not older, except in rare cases like Anakin’s or Quinlan Vos’s, from Master Obi-Wan’s cohort.

“It’s not a vision,” Caleb told Ahsoka determinedly. “I’ve had classes. I know what a vision is.”

“Classes aren’t the same as the real thing,” Ahsoka said; she knew that particular fact better than she’d like. “What do you think you – saw? Sensed?”

The boy hesitated for a few moments, obviously sorting through his thoughts and impressions. His cohortmates glanced at each other, obviously dismissive, but the fact that he was thinking about it made Ahsoka think that he was telling the truth after all. Ahsoka ate another few pieces of her cut fruit as she waited, then pushed the bowl in the direction of the three younglings as an offering. The Twi’lek and the human girl fell on it immediately, but the boy kept frowning.

Finally, he said, “There’s something down there. In the lower levels, I mean, I don’t know what. Something…sinister.”

“There are a lot of things in the lower levels,” Ahsoka said gently. “A lot of them are fairly sinister, but that’s for the city police to deal with.”

“This one is ours,” Caleb said with absolute certainty, and then, like he needed to justify that, “I know it is. I don’t know what it is, but it’s ours.”

“All right,” Ahsoka said slowly. “Why do you think that?”

He frowned again. “I just know it.”

“Did you see anything? Or feel anything?”

The human girl sniggered softly and Caleb shot a hurt look over his shoulder at her. “Cold,” he said. “I felt cold. And I couldn’t see anything but red.”

Somewhat against her better judgment – mostly because, as Ahsoka had thought, Caleb hadn’t had his Gathering yet and didn’t have a lightsaber – Ahsoka checked out a speeder from the Temple garage and went up to the youngling dorms to collect Caleb. She made him exchange the cloak he had put on for a nondescript green poncho with a deep hood, hoping that anyone who spotted him in the lower city would mistake him for an Ugnaught or a Sullustan instead of a Jedi youngling. Ahsoka didn’t think he was helpless – having been a youngling herself more recently than it actually felt, she was under no illusions about the capability of any Jedi no matter their age – but she didn’t want to borrow trouble.

She was aware that a master or a Knight – or even an older padawan – probably wouldn’t have taken Caleb seriously. But several years in the field with a pair of Jedi Knights had taught Ahsoka that the older and more experienced someone got, the more entrenched they were in their own opinions, biases, and traditions. Jedi younglings were in that hundredth of a percentage point of individuals strong enough in the Force to be considered for the Order, and in that thousandth of a percentage point to actually be suited for it. Ahsoka was coming to the conclusion that younglings were more sensitive to the Force than masters, since they didn’t have the weight of the war or the Republic weighing on them, shifting them one way or another.

The more time she spent in the field, the more Ahsoka thought she understood how the long-dead heretics of the past had gone off to found splinter cults on Ahch-To or Jedha or any of the dozens of other lost temple worlds. She didn’t agree with them – that way lay Dooku’s fate and she wanted no part of that – but she was beginning to understand them. If the Force was trying to tell one of its chosen few something, then Ahsoka wasn’t going to deny either it or Caleb Dume.

“Can I drive?” Caleb asked hopefully when they arrived in the speeder bay so that Ahsoka could pick up the speeder she had reserved. She’d done so under Anakin’s name, since that upped the priority level more than using her own would have done. It wasn’t like Anakin was actually going to find out about it; he was busy elsewhere.

“No, you may not,” Ahsoka said firmly.

“I’ve passed my urban flight course.”

“Yes,” Ahsoka said, “but you’re not old enough to drive by Coruscant city law, and I don’t want to get pulled over by a traffic droid.”

Caleb pouted. “Those laws don’t apply to Jedi, do they?”

“Those laws apply to everyone,” Ahsoka said, feeling a sudden surge of sympathy for Anakin. “It’s just that we have a little more leeway with them if we’re on duty. Which we’re not.”

He frowned. “Even though –”

“I’m not on duty unless we find something, and you can’t be on duty yet, youngling,” Ahsoka said pointedly.

#cut scenes and concept writing #ahsoka and caleb adventure tag

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