October Catchall

[faithfulson]

Who: Luke Skywalker, Jaina Solo, Rey, Maul (and probably Reaper)
What: Catchall for October (including events), as well as some backdated stuff. If you would like a prompt, feel free to message me, or start your own thread.
When: Through the month
Where: All through Trench
Content Warnings: Mild body horror in unmasked prompt. Others TBD.

Comments

Jaina Solo | Backdated to not long after her arrival

[faithfulson]

It wasn't like Luke to sleep late. Usually he was up before the sun most days -- a habit from being a farmer on a sun blasted rock his whole life, and cultivated further from being constantly on the move with the Rebellion. But exhaustion both emotional and physical from the month before had taken its toll on him, and over the last few days since being made to move in with his nephew, Luke found himself waking up later and later than usual.

This time it was near noon by the time he crawled out to face the world of the living, and even then, he didn't really want to get out of bed. The sound of movement and a vaguely familiar presence made him roll off though, very nearly losing his footing and faceplanting onto the floor. It... almost felt like Leia, but different -- like this person was somehow a part and yet apart of her at the same time. He didn't want to just dismiss it as him being too tired to get the Force to focus, so he did the only thing his sleepy brain could think to do: carefully pad his way over to where this person was.

Luke found himself staring at a young woman in the living room from the safety of the hallway, frowning slightly. She... strongly resembled Leia, just as she strongly resembled her presence, but she was so young -- closer to Anakin's age, perhaps. It didn't take much before his curiosity got the better of him, and he found himself leaning into the room slightly.

"Hello?" he asked cautiously, not thinking much of the fact that he was standing there in his sleep shirt and pants.

[forcechanic]

Jaina, at least, had been given an overview of who was here from her galaxy. Anakin had managed to cover that much at least. She was sure there was still a lot she needed to learn about, but she's not surprised.

It's mildly surprising to actually see him so young and clearly having just woken up, but she takes it more or less in stride. "Morning, Uncle Luke."

Anakin must have told him, right?

[faithfulson]

Talking to others? In this family? It's more unlikely than you think!

Luke stared at her mutely, his expression more akin to a puppy dog that just got presented with something he didn't know what to do with. He... might have had a conversation with Ani about siblings, but he couldn't recall at the moment. There certainly wasn't any mention of them being here.

"Um..." he muttered, running a hand through sleep tousled hair, not sure what to even say. "Morning?"

Nailed it.

[forcechanic]

"So sometimes you do feel groggy in the morning like the rest of us." SHe flashes a grin that rather clearly labels her as her father's daughter. Though she's still assuming Uncle Luke knows who she is.

"The caf here's okay." And little brothers don't say it'll stunt her growth, so there's that.

[faithfulson]

He was not awake enough for this; now all of a sudden there were female versions of Han running around? At this point in this place, he didn't doubt that this was just another version of his best friend from an alternate universe, and not a niece that Anakin failed to mention.

"I'm still trying to find something better," Luke admitted, his tone cautious.

[forcechanic]

"It's possible Anakin and I grew up around unusually strong caf." Between a pilot dad and a mom who was running the galaxy, there was a lot of caf that she wasn't technically supposed to drink yet but if she was left unsupervised so be it...

[faithfulson]

Luke's brain came to a screeching halt at that; okay, there goes the theory of this being a female Han, unless she was talking about his father, but he doubted that. His mouth worked for a moment, trying to come up with words, before he rubbed at his eyes as if that would help.

"Okay, I... think we need to take a step back a moment," he began.

Rey

[faithfulson]

When Luke wasn't training with Maul, he was training by himself whenever he could find a place without too many eyes watching -- either sentient native or otherwise. It gave him a chance to just listen as he put himself through the motions; let the Force hum through him, connecting him with his lightsaber, with the ground at his feet, and...

...with the surprise audience.

He couldn't find it in him to be annoyed with this audience though, even if he wanted to be. Rey was really, really easy to sense: a bright spot in the Force with a floating connection to him that wasn't quite there, largely due to the fact that he wasn't the person she knew, at least not yet. A faint smile came to his face as he felt her lingering, and he allowed the kata he was currently working on to swing him around, angling the lightsaber just away from her so she wouldn't think he was about to attack, before closing the blade down.

"It's been awhile."

[provenforce]

She hadn't meant to stop and stare. She hadn't even really realized she was sensing Luke at first. He was such a different presence now to what he would be. But watching him go through the motions with his lightsaber was so oddly uplifting to her. She'd never so much as seen him hold his own saber when she had trained with him. Supposedly he'd had it at the end, but she only had the accounts of her friends from that day.

When he speaks she smiles awkwardly, tensing her shoulders into a shrug.

"I was a little embarrassed after our first meeting."

[faithfulson]

"Don't feel embarrassed," he said gently, a warm smile on his face. "All things considered, you had every way to react the way you did."

He considered closing down his lightsaber for a moment, before he tilted his head at her curiously.

"...did you come here with your lightsaber?" he asked curiously.

[provenforce]

"I still feel like I could have handled it better," she had been in Trench long enough to be comfortable with how strange it is people come from different timelines. But it had definitely thrown her to encounter someone like him the first time.

At his question she nods her head, touching the hilt of the blade on her hip.

"I wouldn't go anywhere here without it."

[faithfulson]

"We're all presented challenges that we realize we could have handled better in hindsight," Luke replied, probably sounding more like a teacher than he intended. "It's how we learn, to know how to respond the next time."

He still didn't close down his lightsaber, instead eyeing the lightsaber at her side. It was an interesting hilt, looking like it was made out of something else, though he didn't know her well enough to know if that was the case or not.

"That said," he began again, "would you like to show me what you've learned?"

[provenforce]

Rey can't help the half smile that touches her lips as he seems to effortlessly become a teacher. She had always known this Luke existed, it's just nice to see it.

She is somehow surprised by the offer, to show him what she's learned. She's trained with a saber for a year now, and the months she's been in Trench, but she's never sparred with someone, Leia being far too delicate after her brush with death to be wielding a saber to test her student's mettle.

"Okay, yes." she finally responds, stepping towards Luke and unclipping her saber from her belt.

[faithfulson]

He offered her a grin at her response, absently twirling his lightsaber around in an exaggerated flourish, before holding it up at the ready, waiting for her to make the first move.

Event: Unmasked (mostly for Maul and/or Reaper; can be open) [CW: Mild Body Horror]

[faithfulson]

The masks and facepaints from last year had been fun, to the point where Luke didn't hesitate to be a little more creative with what he wanted to do this time. It was why he eventually found himself sitting down for some face paint, musing over the options for a bit. He settled on the puppy face paint as a joke, mostly; something so that he could pop up on Maul or Reaper, have a laugh about it, and wash it off later on.

He didn't expect the joke to be on him.

It started as an itch first, just at the base of his spine; uncomfortable, but not too hard to ignore. Then the top of his head started to itch, followed by his ears, and got irritating to the point where he had to stop browsing around the Black Parade celebration, ducking between some buildings to figure out what the hell was happening. He found himself scratching fruitlessly at his head as if it would help, though he quickly got fed up with it, one hand drifting down to scratch at an ear while the other went fishing for his omni.

Though, he soon found himself stopping cold when he suddenly found himself holding his ear.

Luke stared at it, absolutely dumbstruck, dimly aware of the other one falling off but not really processing it at the moment. Transforming when he was half crazed and very nearly out of his mind had been a dim, vague thing, to the point where he didn't even occur to him that something similar was happening now until the pain started. He let out a gasp as reality suddenly kicked in, his head feeling like his brain was drowning in the worst headache one could ever imagine as the base of his spine felt it was on fire. Pain in his knees followed soon after as he dropped to the ground, dimly aware of the fact that his mouth was open in a scream, but he was in so much pain that he couldn't even get a sound to come out.

So instead he sent out a plea to the Force, hoping that someone, anyone was nearby to hear him.

Help! Help me, someone! Please!!!

[survivalthroughhate]

Maul had been friends with Luke long enough now to be attuned to him in the Force. So when he felt the young Jedi sending out a mental distress call, he immediately dropped anything he was doing and raced out to find him. He sent a thought to Reaper down their bond. 'Think Luke might be in trouble. I'm going to find him.'

It didn't take him too long to track the Force signature down to its owner. When he found Luke, at first he thought he'd been attacked or he was experiencing one at the moment. "Are you alright? What--?" Then he realized the new ears and tail which had sprouted. Not just any ears. Puppy-dog ears.

He took in the sight. He knew this should have been a serious situation and that he should have been treating it with some gravitas. But gazing at Luke up and down, Maul eventually just broke down in a roar of laughter. He was laughing so hard he had to reach out a hand and lean up against a wall to keep himself upright. This was really just too much.

[faithfulson]

Luke wasn't aware of much, thanks to the way his head was swimming from the pain. He wasn't aware of the tail behind him, sweeping back and forth excitedly at the sound of Maul's voice. He wasn't very aware of the floppy ears that near blended with his hair pressing against the top of his head in protest over how loud Maul was laughing. All he could really figure out right now was that his head hurt and his ears had fallen off.

"Maul...!" he whined in protest. Whatever had just happened was not very funny from his end of things, thanks!

[survivalthroughhate]

Maul began to calm back down, though the sight of the tail wagging was nearly enough to make him lose it again. But then Luke had a whining tone in his voice and all that did was make Maul think of him as a sad, whining puppy-dog, so again he started laughing. "I'm--I'm sorry, it's just--!" He was going to need a few more minutes here, this was too much for him to handle.

As he laughed, he sent Reaper another thought. 'You have got to see this!' Maul sent down the bond gleefully. There was no way his mate would want to pass up the opportunity to troll the young Jedi right now.

Eventually, he was able to stop laughing and approached Luke. He grabbed his friend by the shoulders and looked him over, making sure nothing worse than the tail and ears had come in. Granted, this had happened to Maul a number of months ago, so he knew it might just be a matter of time before Luke turned into a full-blown puppy, but he wasn't going to mention that unless other signs started showing up. He tugged on one of the new ears gently. "How do these feel?"

[faithfulson]

Luke let out a faint whine as his ears were tugged at, but--

...wait.

He looked down at the remains of his human ears on the ground, mouth working, but no sound coming out. Finally, he let out a yelp, rubbing at his face.

"G-get the face paint off!" he begged.

[survivalthroughhate]

"Alright, alright, don't lose your head now," Maul said. He knew such transformations weren't always pleasant to go through, so he did have some real sympathy. There was a water spigot nearby, so Maul turned it on and tore a piece of cloth off his pants to serve as a rag. "Come here." Once it was damp, he started to wipe off the paint on Luke's face.

"You'll likely be stuck with what's already happened for the foreseeable future but I doubt it will last forever," he said as he got most of the paint off. The other thing about transformations in Trench was that they rarely lasted a short amount of time. It appeared their Pthumerian hosts liked to watch them shift forms, perhaps allowing them to feel for a little bit like the Pthumerians themselves even if it was done unwillingly.

As usual, Maul was being followed around by a couple members of his cult. He gestured one of his followers over and whispered something to them. They nodded. "It will be done, Lord Maul." Then off they went. Really, if Luke had turned into a puppy dog, there was only one appropriate way to respond to the situation and that was to get him a collar.

[no_reload]

Reaper had been summoned by Maul's amusement and thoughts that revolved around Luke. He had an idea of what he was getting himself into, but it was far too tempting to avoid this kind of situation. In fact, it was such an opportunity to troll that it was something he felt he needed to do alone. Maul had his time with Luke, so now it was his turn.

Double-dipping so to speak. Luke should appreciate the attention as far as he was concerned.

Except Reaper showed up with a hidden surprise that he pulled from his coat the moment he laid eyes on Luke with the puppy ears and tail. Sometimes Trench pulled something out that was so amusing that he needed Wraith to save the event for prosperities sake. The peacock was around but hidden, watching the whole affair as he pulled out a golden leash from his coat. It jingled when he shook it lightly.

"Well, well, well, looks to me like you've ascended to your final form, as Maul and I predicted."

[faithfulson]

Thankfully by the time Reaper showed up, they had managed to get the face paint off, so at least he didn't have to worry about it getting any worse. Now the only "worse" was from external sources, like the gold leash dangling from the other man's hand. His puppy ears flattened against the top of his head as he narrowed his eyes at him; even his tail thumped against the ground in a show of displeasure.

"...no," he stated bluntly.

[no_reload]

Look at that, the ears were functional and everything, which definitely added to the aesthetic that was being played here. This was rich; it's too bad that he hadn't shown up when Maul was still taking the piss out of Luke, but it was his turn. He found being fashionably late sometimes had added benefits. Besides, it wasn't like he kept a leash around just because.

"Oh you still have a ways left to go for final form? That's expected. A little training should whip you right into shape though." He flipped the leather handle on the end of the leash expertly so it could caress Luke's cheek.

[faithfulson]

Luke had a retort ready on the tip of his tongue, though it died the moment the leather brushed his cheek. His entire face slowly turned a bright shade of cherry red, and now his traitorous tail was thumping against the ground for an entirely different reason. Between this and the collar from before...

He buried his face in his knees, though his tail was still betraying how much Reaper and Maul had caught his attention.

"I can't believe you two," he muttered into his legs. "I just had my ears literally fall off, and you're doing this to me right now."

[no_reload]

Ah yes, there was the reaction he was looking for, and Luke never failed to provide with just a little more pushing. The tail was a dead give away for the younger man's feelings, and he smirked behind his mask, and there was something wonderful about trolling someone that reacted so easily.

He approached to stand in front of Luke, tilting his head with interest as he chuckled and let the leather of the leash dangle down.

"Oh please, now you're just being dramatic. You have ears and they do look so fuzzy and strokable." He made a noise in his throat. "Did Maul stroke your ears? He has a fascination with hair and fur, you know."