Saga - Legends [UDC VIII] Florilegium galacticum

EDIT: Oops, just noticed that this is a double post. mavjade, Briannakin, could one of you delete, please? Thanks.

 

Week 3

11. Helpless

All she could do was stand by and watch the fiery death of the world that gave her birth.

In that moment, she was as she had been on the day of her birth. Helpless, hopeless. Grasped tightly by large, strange hands. Blinded and stunned by the sudden burst of light (if one could call it that). Cut loose; unsure where her next breath would come from. And everything around her was blurry, foggy, unreal.

Afterward, troopers conducted her back to her cell. Once the door was sealed, she wept aloud like an infant. (IT-O was forced to sedate her.)

---

12. Satisfied

With practiced hands Jari’kyn arranged the newly finished dress on the form. Then, as always, she looked it over to see if any last-minute adjustments were needed.

Of course there were some. One stray thread? Easily clipped off. One misaligned sequin in the embroidered design? Easily reattached. One clasp coming loose? Also easily reattached. And oops, another sequin...

But so much was right, too: the sleek design, the flattering shape, the delicate materials. And the color! Vanar always said white was bland—but nonsense! The color of light, bland?

Yes, Jari’kyn was more than satisfied. And Mara would be, too.

---

13. Enough

Noakley, Bonvika’s Swokes Swokes cook, sighed as he scooped the remaining Hom mousse into a container. Six Hom mousses, ten nerf-and-bantha shah-shliiks, five kilos Bababbb-harvested ghanuj—what had Diva Marquisha been thinking?

Okay, the Callosian spring vegetable soup shouldn’t have been… filmy. But Marquisha still should have consulted him before ordering from Lebnan Hut. For he, with the impeccable culinary training he had received from his Aunt Smokie, would have known exactly how much to order for five Hutts—without leaving enough leftovers to feed the entire Imperial armed forces.

He thought about that comparison for a moment, and shuddered.

---

14. Nonstop

I am one with the Force the Force is with me

He stepped into the fray, firm in his resolve never to stop uttering those words, never to stop praying that prayer—even as blaster bolts screamed within inches of his face.

I am one with the Force the Force is with me

And those words, repeated over and over, became for him the light (or something like it—what did light look like, anyway?) that guided his path and illumined his goal.

I am one with the Force the Force is with me

He grasped the switch and pulled—

---

15. Burn

In that moment of burning pain, after the quarry (blast and befog her!) had wrenched off his respirator mask, his people’s ancient proverb came back to him:

“Fill your enemies with primal fear, then fill their lungs with fire!”

But now he was the enemy. His own primal fear had sapped his presence of mind, causing him to gasp those three toxic breaths. And now his own lungs were full of fire—oxygenous fire that raged and ravaged.

From the moment he had completed his apprenticeship he had lived by those words—and now was he to die by them?

---

Spoiler: Notes

11. Leia, during and after watching the destruction of Alderaan in A New Hope.

12. Jari’kyn is the designer of Mara Jade’s wedding dress in Union. Vanar is her boss, who is jealous of the fact that Mara is likely to prefer Jari’kyn’s designs to his. He fires Jari’kyn, but Mara finds her crying in an alley, talks to her, and hires her.

13. Noakley is an OC who first appears in “In Search of a Hutt’s Dinner Music,” and this drabble takes place in the aftermath of that story. Except for the Callosian spring vegetable soup, which is established, all of the foods and dishes mentioned (and Lebnan food in general) are the creations of Chyntuck; see her fanon post. Although there is not much in the established lore about Imperial presence on the Swokes Swokes homeworld of Makem Te, it doesn’t seem outside the realm of possibility.

14. Chirrut Îmwe’s last moments in Rogue One.

15. The injury that nearly destroys Zuckuss’s lungs by causing him to breathe oxygen, recounted at the beginning of his story in Tales of the Bounty Hunters. (Not to worry: he doesn’t die, but rather joins the Rebellion, who in turn help him get the medical care he needs to heal.) The proverb is taken from Essential Guide to Weapons and Technology (Del Rey, 1997), where it appears with the entry for the Merr-Sonn Model CR-42 flame rifle.

 

Helpless: This one pushed all of my buttons and then some. What a haunting, expressive look at Leia's loss! I loved your choice of words - working in that it was her birth-world (such is a fact to her heart) being destroyed, when her biological father, unbeknownst, is the one standing there and holding her still. Saying that it was a light, in a terrible way; and then her being so disoriented after . . . . It's to be expected, and I'm simply glad that you gave her this moment of grief, no matter how awful the process. She's always so strong about the loss of her homeworld after - both from necessity, and, honestly, a glaring hole in the OT writing that her grief was never quite focused on or mentioned again.

Satisfied: Because artists are never truly satisfied! I loved the attention to detail, and the clear skill of the designer. And then Mara's name was revealed at the end, and I just smiled like a loon! That made my shipper's heart happy.

Enough: It does seem as if an enough is warranted with such an overabundance. I enjoyed how light-hearted and day-to-day this one was until the last line - the Empire really does make it impossible for any of its citizens to live normal, healthy lives.

Nonstop: Gah! If there was a better fit for the prompt, then I can't think of it. A beautifully powerful homage to that scene.

Burn: Zuckuss!! (I went through my bounty hunter phase early in my fandom days - my Bounty Hunter trilogy is as worn as my Thrawn saga, honestly - so, seeing him pop up here brought back such a lovely feeling. But, enough about me!) This was such a great reversal on the proverb that it had to stick in Zuckuss' mind while he thought he was awaiting his death. The primal, desperate fear he was feeling really shone through here, and made for a powerful drabble.


Excellent job, again! I believe that this week was my favourite yet.

(And, I am most interested in that ebook of the Book of Gand when you get finished with it, though that's in no way me asking you to rush. So please keep me updated. I'm going to have lots of commuting time coming up this year, and that sounds like a perfect novel to dive into. I honestly have a couple of epics on the boards that I need to catch up on - there's so much to read and so little time. )

 

WarmNyota_SweetAyesha 's recent comment has reminded me that I have been extremely remiss in responding to comments on these—really sorry about that, everyone! It doesn't mean I don't appreciate your reading and commenting, which I certainly do.

Thanks so much for reading and commenting, I-5; I'm glad these resonated with you and that you found them enjoyable. I admit thebusniess with the spike is perhaps a bit abstruse, but the idea, as stated in an earlier comment response (post #8), is that the Wookie has hacked/sliced the datacard that the Falleen now has to surrender to Lando—so she can afford to be smug and calm instead of pulling the opponent's arms out of their sockets. Sneaky, eh—make a little more sense now, I hope?

Thanks so much, Azure! I appreciate your reading and commenting—and nice pun there about "sight" for no. 14. What can I say—he just seemed like the perfect fit for that prompt. Leia, too, for "Helpless"—and of course since the film doesn't show any of her emotional fallout at all, well, that's up to us fanfic writers, I suppose. Glad it didn't take too long to warm up to the others; I know I put kind of a smorgasbord of ECs and OCs here, though that kind of variety is part of the fun of the drabble genre, methinks.

Thanks so much, as always, for reading and for your insights. This prompt led me to think about the destruction of Alderaan as a rebirth of sorts for Leia—we think of rebirths as being positive, refreshing, renewal type experiences, but not this one—she's been well and truly cut loose forever from the only homeworld and family she ever knew, just as a newborn baby is cut from its umbilical cord. I really liked Jari'kyn in Union and enjoyed giving her a little moment of her own here, to be pleased with her own craftsmanship and skill in creating a work of beauty.

"Enough" ties in to the events of "In Search of a Hutt's Dinner Music," where Marquisha tests the soup Noakley made for the Hutts' dinner party and declares it unfit (because it's not supposed to be filmy). Because there isn't time for Noakley to make everything again, Marquisha orders Lebnan take-out for the party instead—but here we see that she ordered way too much, creating the tons of leftovers. The fanon dishes are of course the creations of Chyntuck, described in her Lebnan food fanon post.

As for Chirrut, well, my first thought was that he does repeat that mantra nonstop! Many blind people can indeed at least tell whether the environment around them is light or dark, and I had a bit of fun here playing with literal vs. figurative interpretations of that, so I'm glad it came off effectively. In Zuckuss's case, since he breathes ammonia and oxygen is poisonous to him, I guess his condition in this moment is what you could call hyperoxia—his lungs are being burned apart by the influx of oxygen. He does indeed eventually get help; on one hand, it's at a bit of a cost, but on the other, it will lead him to new possibilities.

Thank you so much for reading and for your insightful comments, Mira—it's always a treat to see you here! I think this may have been one of my own favorite weeks, too, at least of the three (!) drabble weeks I've done so far.

I'm glad Leia's moment of grief in "Helpless" resonated with you; again, I just wanted to give her the chance to be able to cry, mourn, grieve, etc., since the films give her absolutely none. And yes, the whole idea that that's her father standing right their behind her always haunted me too; if this is Leia's rebirth, then Vader's the one who has "caught" her, and it wasn't the loving, warm, nurturing kind of "catch" that usually happens at a birth.

I am one of those types who's never quite completely satisfied with owns my creations—my betas will tell you that I constantly tweak and rework like there's no tomorrow—so I suppose I projected some of that onto this sweet, understated character from Union. Though hers a good and happy sort of "non-satisfaction," I'd say, because it comes along with the knowledge that she's made something beautiful and someone happy.

Noakley definitely wishes he could have said "ENOUGH!" to all the excess food—perhaps partly because the sheer amount of it reminds me of the sheer numbers of forces that are relentlessly invading corner after corner of the Galaxy at this stage (and as I said in the note I could see him having unpleasant memories of Imperial presence on his own homeworld). And again, Chirrut and his mantra just seemed like the perfect match for "Nonstop." But not only the mantra—his dogged persistence in making it through the crossfire to that switch exemplifies "nonstop" like few other things in that film do.

Finally, when I first read about that particular "ancient Gand proverb" on the Wook, it got me immediately thinking of Zuckuss's lung injury, an instance of his own lungs being "filled with fire," and the "Burn" prompt was the natural perfect match. (Actually, one thing that I always wondered was how fire might actually work on a planet with an ammoniac atmosphere; the chemical workings behind combustion must be much, much different on Gand than on Earth.)

It's coming, it's coming, I promise. If you like I can hook you up with a very basic throw-together of part 1 as a stopgap of sorts; just let me know by PM if so. I totally know just what you mean about so much to read and so little time, though—I'm in the very same boat myself! That's why I thank you again for taking the time to read these.

Thanks so much as always for your comments and insights! Even a "strong" character like Leia has to have moments of this kind of emotional helplessness and catharsis; arguably that's what adds up to make them even stronger in the end. I mean, gosh, the whole enormity of what's happening—her whole HOMEWORLD destroyed—how could a being of flesh and blood not cry like they've never cried before? And yes, again, the presence of her father in this makes all the more of a wrench—see above about his "catching" her in this moment of rebirth.

I was always partial to the meek-yet-creative Jari'kyn, perhaps because that juxtaposition resonates personally with me a lot: loving to create beauty, often lacking confidence, but gaining it back with kindness and support. I always liked the scene where Mara meets her and comforts her, which ends with the two shaking hands and smiling—just such a sweet moment of "lifting up the downtrodden."

I say definitely go grab that red-pepper hummus and dig in—good stuff, that! One has to have impeccable culinary training to be able to know how much to feed five Hutts, dont'cha know! But yeah, as a layperson in that regard, I wonder that too.

Chirrut was a true perpetual-motion-machine of a Whills shaman, wasn't he? He never slowed down, not only when there was blaster fire all around, and he stopped only at the precisely right moment.

And I'm glad you found Zuckuss's "Burn" moment compelling—such an injury would have been a huge turning point for him, but it's only ever described indirectly in the official lore—so I enjoyed the chance to try my own hand at it.

Thanks so much for coming by to read and review, Nyota, and I'm so glad you enjoyed these. "Valor" partly represented my own trepidation going into the drabble challenge; one often won't know if it's really worth being afraid of something until one screws up one's courage and actually does it, so they really do go together. Even the biggest victories come with those mixed feelings—where, indeed, are the fireworks after all that, and more importantly, where are Biggs and Dutch and Porkins and all my other comrades? (That's something that I felt was passed over in the films, too.) The Rogues' milk highjinks in "Date" of course tie in to the stories of the Dear Dairy Challenge—Briannakin's story in that series features the Rogues, and mine features a milk-induced vision on Luke's part, so I did a little mashup of motifs there. The Alderaan scene was the first that came to my mind for "Helpless"; there, too, I wanted to give the character and the scene some emotional closure that I felt the films lacked. And I'm so glad you're satisfied with "Satisfied"—I enjoyed revisiting Union for that one, too.

Once again, many thanks and much appreciation to you all for reading and commenting! I hope to be able to return to these someday; this first bunch was quite a lot of fun to write, and you all make it even more so.

 

Many thanks, as always, for the readership and comments.

Thanks so much, earlybird! I'm very glad you enjoyed the one about Zuckuss; I just felt that "fill their lungs with fire" Gand proverb was not only a perfect match for "Burn" but also for Zuckuss's own story, with the lung injury. I will do my best to write more of these—I have some other projects to get out of the way first, but I do intend to eventually get to all twenty weeks.

Thanks so much, Azure, I really appreciate that! All of my readers mean a lot to me, and I want to do the best I can to show them the proper appreciation for taking their time—and their chances—on my work.

Thanks so much, Renata! That's pretty much exactly how I'm interpreting the seeming stoicism that they gave Leia at that moment of the film—she is, after all, a consummate diplomat, and sure, she would use those skills then as well as any other time—but how could the sheer enormity of the disaster not eventually catch up with her? That was her world, her life, everything she loved... she may be a diplomat, but she's not made of marble.

Thank you, and I'm glad you found what I did here effective. Chirrut made a big impression on me in Rogue One; I found his whole brand of not-quite-Jedi-but-something-different Force ability as a Whills shaman really intriguing, and his moment of sacrifice just after pulling the switch was one of the scenes that really stood out for me. It's been hard for me to write about any of the characters in R1 just because of the overwhelmingly tragic nature of the story, but when the "Nonstop" prompt cropped up, it just fit so well that I couldn't resist. So behold my first, and so far only, piece of R1 writing—of which I'm still quite proud!

Thanks again, and I'm so glad this resonated with you even though the character and scenario were unfamiliar. Drowning is a very apt way to describe Zuckuss's experience here—in this case he's drowning in fire, not water, but it's filling his lungs in the same way water would those of a drowning being, enveloping him and almost transforming him into itself. And if that's not just cause for primal fear, I don't know what is!

(A general note on the Zuckuss drabble and those like it in the previous sets: You all may have noticed that each of my sets so far includes one Gand-related drabble—and at present my plan is for that to be the case with all future drabble sets I write in this challenge, too. In tribute to my fanfic roots, one might say. )

Thank you all so much for taking the time to read and comment—once again, it really does mean a lot to me.