May the 4th 2024 letter

[elsajeni]

Dear Yoda -- thank you for stopping by! You've seen my general likes/DNWs in my signup already, but here they are again, for the sake of having everything in one place:

Likes: bantering and bickering; moments of humor even in dark situations; pining; mutual pining; hurt/comfort; action, adventure, rescue missions; casual relationships; relationships that were supposed to be casual but didn't stay that way; "undercover as a couple" tropes; "actually a couple, undercover as something else" tropes.

Sex & Kink Likes, if you go in that direction: light bondage; lots of talking during sex, both sweet and dirty; laughing during sex; roleplay; roleplay that goes off the rails a little; inappropriate use of Force powers; "foreplay" activities as the main event; overstimulation. If you're writing about teen characters, I'd rather not have anything explicit on-page (as noted in my DNWs), but I'm fine with offscreen or fade-to-black sex.

DNWs: rape/non-con unless specified; incest; explicit scenes with underage characters; detailed description of bodily fluids; setting change or mundane AUs (coffeeshop, high school, etc.); omegaverse; infidelity (consensual non-monogamy is fine); pregnancy, miscarriage, or infertility; unrelentingly dark and grim stories (I like a glimmering of hope); Wedge's new-canon background.

Canon preferences: I'm sure you can tell from my request list that I love and miss the old EU/Legends content -- for any character that has both Legends and canon versions, I'm probably thinking of the Legends version. (Although I also really liked TLJ and new-canon Luke; I know prickly withdrawn hermit Luke was not everybody's jam, but he is mine.) I also love gluing the loose ends of Legends continuity into the loose ends of sequel trilogy continuity, and some of my prompts are mix-and-matchy -- please do feel free to mix and match! (Wedge's backstory is the one place where I do have a strong preference; Legends Wedge only, please.)

My main requests are for fic, but if you've ended up here because you're considering a treat, please know I'd be delighted to receive an art treat!

Now: prompts and details!



Character: Falynn Sandskimmer

• Listen. I've been marching up and down carrying this banner that says "FALYNN SANDSKIMMER DESERVED BETTER" for so long. My arms are so tired. You take it for a minute, won't you?
• Let Falynn survive and prove herself and be happy! With Myn or without (slight preference for without, tbh!). I'd especially like to see her get past the embarrassment of thoughtlessly insulting Piggy and develop a real friendship with him.
• Alternately, something from her past -- teen Falynn raising hell in Mos Eisley? Or the misadventures in her early career that put her on track for Wraith Squadron?
• We know our girl hates being compared to Luke Skywalker. Tell me a little more about that -- is this something you start hearing as a kid on Tatooine? (Is it about your piloting skill or your hellraising behavior?) Or was it an unpleasant surprise when Falynn finally got off-planet and joined up?

Biggs Darklighter/Luke Skywalker

• I like this a lot as a teen relationship that grows easily out of their friendship, is fun while it lasts, and transitions pretty naturally back into friendship when it ends.
• That said, anything you do here is going to be a little tinged with sadness; if you prefer it a LOT tinged with sadness, I'd also love a fic set during the brief window between when they reconnect in the Rebellion and the Death Star run.
• Alternately, get weird with it -- find a way for Biggs to survive, or bring him back from the dead. Write that Space Winter Soldier AU that I secretly kind of love, or Luke being haunted by the literal ghosts of his past.
• (If you're thinking in a ghost/undead/rescue-from-the-underworld sort of direction, I have a whole tumblr tag of posts I was collecting for Ghost Phanan reasons -- see Face/Phanan, below -- but some of them might also be inspiring for Ghost Biggs.)

Garik "Face" Loran/Ton Phanan

• This is a long shot, but: GHOSTS.
• Ton hangs around after death -- where else does he have to go, after all? Haunting all the Wraiths, or just Face, or trying to figure out how he can weaponize haunting and go ruin some Imperials' day. Making Face miserable, or still making him laugh (and is he real, or is this some kind of coping mechanism, and does Face really want to know which?), or not seeming to know he's dead.
• I have a whole tumblr tag collecting posts that give me Ghost/Undead Phanan feels, if any of that grabs you
• If ghosts aren't for you, maybe some kind of resurrection or rescue from the underworld? Or a less metaphysical fix-it that just lets him survive?
• Or, of course, I won't turn down just two best friends and wingmates in happier days, getting into trouble and having very snarky sex.
• This is also the rare pairing where I'm kind of into a soulmate/soulmark AU -- look, I am normally kind of a mean, cynical person about soulmate stuff. But it works for me here, because I think Ton would be too! Knowing he has a soulmate definitely complicates his "no future worth living for" thing -- but what good is a soulmark if it was on the hand you lost over Endor and no one but you can ever know what it said?

Mara Jade/Gara Petothel | Lara Notsil

• Is this ridiculous? Yes. Do I love it anyway? Yes.
• The most plausible version of this is maybe Mara/"Kirney" during Lara's Intelligence training -- the timeline is a little vague, but it seems plausible that they might have been on Imperial Center at the same time, and that the Emperor's Hand might have been sent to the same kind of society parties where Kirney Slane flirted with up-and-coming officers.
• I would love to see promising young Intelligence trainee "Kirney" trying to figure out exactly what is going on with this Woman of Mystery she keeps running into at parties -- or getting tangled up in whatever mission or investigation Mara is working on?
• Alternately, I think they could have some very interesting things to say to one another later on, after they've both changed sides (a few times, in Lara's case) and are making progress on sorting out what the Empire did to their heads.
• An interesting angle might be the two of them meeting later on and realizing that they also met before -- Lara becomes Kirney again in the end, after all, and I'm a sucker for the idea of shuttle pilot Kirney running into someone who knew party girl Kirney and having to navigate the "well I never would have expected you'd end up here!" conversation. (How quickly does Mara cotton on to what really happened? How much of it is Kirney willing to tell her -- and how much of Mara's own history is she willing to tell Kirney?)

Myn Donos/Gara Petothel | Lara Notsil

• Just hurt my feelings
• What really works for me is those agonizing bits of Solo Command where Lara is trying to convince Myn to stay away from her, and clearly trying to convince herself as well -- I'd love a fic that puts them in a situation where it would be so easy to give in, or a situation where she does give in and then has to try and figure out how to take it back.
• This feels very ripe for rescue missions or hurt/comfort -- the situation is going from bad to worse, the emotions are heightened, let's see what kind of unexpected feelings and truths shake out.
• For a happier take, how about the story of how they made their way back together? In canon, we have the message Myn gets from "Kirney," and then a glimpse of Donoslane Excursions like 30 years later -- what happened in between? How did Myn answer that message, when did he come back to Corellia to join her, what else bridges that decades-long gap?

Winter Celchu/Mara Jade

• What I'm really interested in here is Targeter and the Emperor's Hand, meeting by chance -- both on separate missions, neither one aware of who the other one is, but hey, they've got a little extra time and there's nothing in their mission parameters that says they can't take one night out to spend with an interesting new friend.
• Or, maybe one or both of them did know who they were dealing with -- hatesex? Pure curiosity about the other side? A honeypot act, trying to coax some information out of their counterpart?
• (What must they both be thinking when they meet again, formally this time, as representatives of the New Republic and Karrde's organization? Do they talk about it? Does anything rekindle?)

Lando Calrissian/Mara Jade/Luke Skywalker

• I liked Lando and Mara's EU relationship, and wasn't too happy with the "it was all just a cover" retcon -- show me the time, or times, that it wasn't just a cover. I also like Lando/Luke as kind of a casual-relationship pairing,, so why not bring it all together?
• Three busy people who all care deeply for each other, but aren't often in the same place at the same time -- so when they are, well, let's meet over a mug of hot chocolate and see where the evening takes us, shall we?
• This would also be fun as a mission!fic of some kind -- one of those fun EU investigative bits with some undercover work, or something more straightforwardly dangerous with opportunities for daring rescues and h/c, or a little of both!
• I'd prefer this with everyone on a more-or-less equal footing, rather than one established couple and an outside third party.
• A dynamic I like on the Lando/Mara side here is: Lando is totally sincere and genuine in his charm; Mara is losing her mind trying to figure out what the hell his ulterior motive is. Lando is going to show you a nice time if it goddamn kills him; Mara is actually... to her surprise, and sort of against her will... having a nice time?
• A dynamic I like on the Lando/Luke side: Luke stumbles onto the Falcon off the bottom of Cloud City, traumatized and not 100% lucid and desperately needing to say something about what just happened to somebody, and that's how Lando was briefly the only person in the galaxy who knew a Real Big Secret about Luke Skywalker. A friendship shaped by this intensely weird and also weirdly intense first meeting and the trust that grew out of it.

Wedge Antilles/Leia Organa/Han Solo

• What can I say, I love a threesome.
• With this one, what I'd most like to see is Leia and Han inviting an old friend (or friendly ex?) into their bedroom as a one-time fling or an ongoing, but casual, FWB arrangement; I'm less interested in a long-term triad.
• I've always been very fond of the friendship Wedge seems to have with Leia in Legends; I'd love that to be his closer tie to her and Han, or make that a "friendly exes" situation.
• This could be interesting to bring into the sequel timeline -- I can see Wedge as the solid point that both Leia and Han end up orbiting after their relationship has sort of fallen apart, slowly drawing them back together into a new balance.

Wedge Antilles/Mara Jade/Luke Skywalker

• I'd love to see this as a V with Luke at the point gradually changing shape into a more even triad, as Wedge and Mara come to see more in each other than Commander Square Corners and a barely-trustworthy semi-reformed Imperial assassin.
• Maybe some kind of rescue mission or undercover work, an outside crisis that forces Wedge and Mara to rely on each other and build up that base of trust and respect?
• I'm most interested in this as a getting-together or early-relationship fic, with everyone still sorting out their feelings and their respective claims on each other.
• Alternately, if you want to tie this into the sequel trilogy timeline, I'm interested in what Luke's choice to isolate himself would have meant for this relationship -- were either or both of them ever on Ahch-To with him? Have they been in contact at all since he disappeared? (Have Wedge and Mara stayed together without him, or drifted apart?) When he reappears, are they in a rush to see him again, or are one or both of their feelings more complicated? (If you go this route, I am very happy to see an AU where Luke doesn't die! But I can also get along with a downer ending -- or maybe some Force-ghost contact after death?)

Wedge Antilles/Luke Skywalker

• I'm interested in the pressures that their respective positions and commitments put on the relationship, and especially the difficulty of maintaining a relationship with someone who keeps disappearing on incomprehensible Jedi business.
• Luke just up and vanishing off of Hoth is a pivotal moment in my idea of this relationship. What the fuck, man.
• Followed, of course, by years where it seems like they never get to be in the same place at the same time -- when "long-distance" means literal light years, how do you keep it together? (And how great are the rare but treasured times when you actually get to be on the same planet at the same time for a couple days?)
• Alternately, go back further in time: a little pilot training (Luke may have been a natural pilot, but someone at least had to show him the X-wing controls, right?), for a fun silly version, or two freaked-out survivors of the Death Star run finding comfort with each other, for something more bittersweet.
• (On that last one: I headcanon that the yellow jacket Luke wears for the medal ceremony is Wedge's. How'd he end up wearing it?)
• I guess we've gotten a glimpse at sequel-era Wedge now, which is what I've been asking for the last few years. But I would still like something that brings (Legends) Wedge and Luke as a couple into the sequel trilogy timeline, in which case the same ideas as for Wedge/Mara/Luke apply -- have they been in contact since Luke pulled his disappearing act, did Wedge ever join him on Ahch-To, is Wedge in a rush to see him again or is it more complicated than that?

Mara Jade/Darth Vader

• I'm interested in Mara's childhood and youth, and the sort of... just-under-the-surface yawning horror that we know is there, but that's not really dug into much in Legends. I think it is technically Legends canon that Palpatine kept his two pets pretty separate, but that's no fun. Let me see the time they did encounter each other -- as rivals for Palpatine's attention, as tentative allies in the intrigues of the Imperial court, as student and tutor?
• This could go in a lot of different directions, from something as relatively innocent as a kid's awkward crush on the only person she's ever met who has anything in common with her, to something as dark as the Emperor straight-up ordering one of them to the other's bedroom. Whatever you do with it, I'd like you to treat the power dynamics and age dynamics here seriously, and lean into the darkness that's present in what we know about Mara's upbringing -- no one here is really having a good time or doing something they'll look back on fondly.
• This is the one sort-of exception to my "no rape/non-con" clause -- the questionable or compromised consent that the situation implies is part of what I like about it. But I'd prefer that you stay more on the "dubcon" side of the line. Deceit, coercion, and uncomfortable power imbalances: yes! Violence, physical or Force-based force, or explicit non-consent that's ignored: no.
• (Please note that it is NOT an exception to the explicit underage DNW -- if you write this with Mara as a teen, please keep anything explicitly sexual off-screen.)