────────Garden Song, Phoebe Bridgers

        Del Kryze was born into a world of peace and came out of it as a weapon of war. Del was born into a planet torn apart from the inside out by war and it had only just begun to sew itself back together by the pacifist movement of Dutchess Satine Kryze. Once, children of Mandalore were bread for violence and brutality—bred to become warriors and bow to no man—but at the turning of the tides of the war that had torn the planet apart from the inside out, Madalore is ready for a new era; one of peace. Del's birth was meant to be the symbol of a new age; a child that was born in the pink dawn of peace. Del was a child bred for peace until they were ultimately sent to fight in a war. They were ten when the war began and thirteen when it ended. They watched as the Jedi became war generals and commanded legions of clones at the behest of the Galactic Republic and the Jedi splintered away from everything that they once stood for. Children were taught to take things apart rather than put things back together. Lightsabers were once meant as a last resort, but Del had forgotten how light their hand felt without the weight of the sword wrapped in their fingers.

Del never really saw the end of the war. They were forced to live with the aftermath and they soon learn that only the dead truly see the end of the war—those lucky enough to survive have to live with the consequences of their actions. The war took everything from them; their mother, their father, their childhood, their friends, their master, and the only home they had ever really known. They are forced to lose themself in order to save themself and in the wreckage of it all, they ask themself: Who am I now? Even before the end of the war; Del had always been stuck in that position between their duties as a Mandalorian and their duties as a Jedi—as their mother's child, should they follow in their mother's pacifistic footsteps in order to bring peace and lay down the weapon that had been molded to their hand, or as a Jedi, should they encourage peace with a steel fist and iron lungs, or should they follow in the footsteps of the Mandalorians who came before them and use any means necessary to protect their homeworld and their people? As a Jedi, they are expected to forgo all attachments, but as a Mandalorian, they are taught that loyalty and solidarity are the way. Del once sought to find the middle ground between the two—it had been done before, so surely it could be done again—but you cannot keep the peace by forcing it with a clenched fist.

They're en route to Coruscant with their mother's killer in the Tribunal's detention center when the Jedi Order falls and their Clones turn against them. Barely surviving with the skin of their own teeth, Del and Ahsoka fake their deaths and bury their lightsabers along with their identities, melting into the shadows because the galaxy is no longer a safe place for people like them. They spend the next few years with their heads down and slowly biding their time because one wrong move could cost them everything. All the while, something ugly rears its head inside Del's stomach, and because they have always been a match lit and a match dropped, ready to set everything in their path ablaze, they let that ugliness grow inside their stomach. They are no longer Jedi, so there is nothing stopping them from allowing that ugly feeling of vengeance to grow inside of them until suddenly, it has become their stomach and their stomach is trying to claw its way out of their throat and it's screaming one name over and over again: Maul. They hear it in their head like the beating of their heart. Maul, Maul, Maul. They are a punisher and he is going to walk right into the knife clenched in their fist.

Del finds themself journeying across the galaxy in an effort to hunt down the fallen Sith lord, consumed with the thought of skinking their teeth into the skin of their mother's killer. Vengeance is in their heart and death is in their hands. But when an old friend reaches out a hand and offers them a chance to build something more, something greater, everything changes.

milly alcock & phia saban.        Delaine  Del  Kryze
they/them.  neutral good.  infj.

SOUNDTRACK

𝖎. Sour Times ───── The Civil Wars

𝖎𝖎. I Found ───── Amber Run

𝖎𝖎𝖎. Second Chances ───── Gregory Alan Isakov

𝖎𝖛. Dynasty ───── MIIA

𝖛. The Last of the Real Ones ───── Fall Out Boy

𝖛𝖎. Soap ───── The Oh Hellos

𝖛𝖎𝖎. Saturn ───── Sleeping At Last

𝖛𝖎𝖎𝖎. I'll Be Good ───── James Young

𝖎𝖝. In Our Bedroom After the War ───── Stars

𝖝. A Pearl ───── Mitski

Timeline:

Jedi: Fallen Order ─── 14 BBY

Jedi: Battle Scars ─── 13 BBY

Jedi: Survivor ─── 9 BBY

Obi-Wan Kenobi ─── 9 BBY

Disclaimer: i do not own star wars, the jedi games, their locations, dialogue, plot, or characters.  i am only responsible for del, any other characters you do not recognize from the original source materials and their development.

Warnings: canon-typical warnings for jedi survivor, character death, violence, dismemberment, gore, war, references to genocide, mature language, (implied) sexual content, mental health issues (PTSD, anxiety, depression, etc), poor coping mechanisms, trauma, complicated family dynamics.

Note: LLMAO. rewrite number 3554568, let's hope this one sticks; there were a lot of things that i didn't like about the previous version and i'm starting this completely from scratch. sorry but i genuinely cannot see del willingly working with bo-katan no matter how i try to frame it.

not really sure how i feel about the summary, i might come back and change it later but i wanted to at the very least get this out.

ignore the picture of emma d'arcy in the moodboard, i was originally using them for del during jedi survivor and beyond, but i decided that phia saban fits del better for survivor and will be using emma d'arcy for if i ever get to the original trilogy era.

i don't have much to say, a quick rundown of this fic:

✶ anticipated timeline of this fic: fallen order — battle scars — survivor — obi-wan kenobi — 3rd jedi game, however if it's starting to get long, i will split this fic into two

✶ as of now, smoke signals is the only fic published in my star wars series; if/when i post my other fics there may be a lot of overlap between several different characters eheheheh

✶ delaine means "dark challenger" which i think is a good tie-in to both their relationship to the force as well as just their overall outlook on life.

✶ del is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns it really should go without saying but respect their pronouns please and thank you :)

✶ this is a cal fic but making it cal x del x merrin is still totally on the table

✶ del is mandalorian and a kryze!!! aka they are an obitine child. i don't know if that's actually possible timeline-wise, but we're gonna ignore that because i got too attached to this idea.

✶ childhood friends to lovers my beloved <333