SW Gray Tales 34.1: Premonitions

Apologies to Jedi Knight users, I had thought that I had updated access to these chapters but somehow it was just showing that to me, but opening it on any other browser wasn't.

I had talked mailed patreon support but it got sorted out automatically.
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Just as I was internally monologuing about my tragic Force dysfunction like a Sith-themed diary entry, the door hissed open.

Enter: Vasha.

Loose shirt, no pants. Just that soft, slightly oversized top that hung off one shoulder like it had a casual grudge against symmetry, and a pair of underwear that were absolutely not helping my focus situation. Somehow she had managed to simultaneously top both the Hotness and Cuteness charts with one outfit. Like, girl, pick a lane—or at least give the rest of us a chance to emotionally prepare.

She didn’t say anything. Just sauntered in like a sleep-deprived goddess, flopped back-first onto the bed with all the grace of a Twi’lek who’d been wrestling with ship parts since dawn, and let out a muffled groan that translated directly to: "If one more droid misroutes power, I’m gonna eat a fusion coil."

My Force stuff?

Yeah, that got Thanos-snapped straight out of my frontal lobe.

I sighed, waved a hand, and floated the caf cup gently back to the table with just enough precision to not spill it—minor flex—and then let gravity do the rest of the work.

Then head meet thighs. Thick thighs if I may add.

Soft too. The kind of soft that made your soul consider giving up personal goals and becoming a full-time pillow.

She cracked an eye open lazily, her lekku giving the tiniest twitch as I flopped onto her like a Force-sensitive cat.

“Whassup, champ?” she mumbled, half-smirking.

I just mumbled into her leg, “Thinking deep thoughts. Failing to move furniture with my mind. Usual.”

“Uh-huh.” She yawned. “Bet the furniture won.”

“It always does.”

She chuckled and let her fingers trail through my hair, lazily combing out whatever sleep-snarls or Force-induced static I’d built up. Her touch was automatic now—habitual. Casual. Dangerously affectionate.

I was supposed to be contemplating metaphysical failure.

Instead I was lying here, cheek squished against thigh, pulse doing weird gymnastics, and enjoying the reality of fact that the person I maybe-kind-of-sorta had an unspoken, unfixable crush on was casually letting me use her lap as a meditation spot.

Send help.

Or don't.

I wasn’t moving.

She kept running her fingers through my hair, the kind of idle affection that made my neurons melt and file for early retirement. I was about 30 seconds from dozing off in a bliss coma when she said:

“Oh, by the way. I dropped by Jon while you were roof-meditating or whatever it is you do up there. Heard the Empire’s planning to hike tech taxes to forty percent next quarter.”

I blinked. Lifted my head a few millimeters. “Wait. Forty? Didn’t those—”
I paused. Tried to find a replacement word for the one I was about to use. Failed. Settled for tone.

“Didn’t they just raise it to thirty-five last year? What are they doing, funding their mom’s retirement plan? Or buying gold-plated toilets for stormtroopers?”

Vasha snorted. “Empire, babe. That’s the whole business model: steal stuff, tax the rest, then call it ‘order.’”

She adjusted her position slightly, shirt riding up just a little more. (RIP my willpower. You were loved.)

“Saw that Emperor guy on the holonet the other week,” she added. “Did a speech about... I don’t know, ‘youth education initiatives’ or something. Honestly? Dude looks shady as hell. Like, if you shriveled up a raisin in engine grease and taught it how to lie into a camera.”

That got me. I snorted into her thigh. “Shady’s putting it mildly. That guy gives me ‘would sell his mother for a sack of bantha shit’ vibes.”

She reached down and pinched my cheek. “Language.”

“Hey—ow! Too hard!” I grumbled, muffled by Lekku-adjacent fabric. “Gods know what the Senate was smoking when they elected him. Was it just compressed Jawa dust and hope?”

She laughed under her breath. It was tired laughter, the kind you only get after twelve hours of dealing with dead power couplings and clients who think just cause shop sells second hand stuff, they can low ball it. Cheap-ass Bitches.

Then she said, “You want dinner? I’m not really in the mood to eat, but I can heat up the spice rice if you’re hungry.”

I sighed and let my head drop fully back into her lap, burying my face deeper into the very definition of soft blue comfort. “I’m hungry for sleep, if anything.”

“Fair,” she murmured, fingers still in my hair. “Sleep now. Food later. Rage against the machine tomorrow.”

“Sounds like a plan,” I mumbled into her legs.

And just like that, Force theory and galactic tax policy both got deleted from RAM.

All that existed was the faint hum of shop equipment in the other room, the smell of grease and caf, and Vasha’s pulse, slow and steady beneath my cheek.

Peaceful. For now.

...

...

Dark.

Still.

Too still.

I woke up like I’d just been dropped from orbit—heart pounding like a war drum, breath coming in short, clipped bursts. Disoriented didn’t even cover it. My brain felt like someone had taken a blender to it mid-dream.

For a few seconds, I didn’t even know where I was. All I knew was something was wrong.

The bed was cold on one side.

Too cold.

No familiar warmth. No soft thigh pillow. No steady heartbeat near mine. No Vasha.

And I swear to whatever half-dead gods float in the Force, every instinct in my body just started screaming.

Panic hit like a gut punch. A cold, sharp absence. Like someone had unplugged something vital from the world and I was the only one who noticed.

I sat up too fast, dizziness whiplashing through my skull. Eyes darted. Room swam in and out of focus. Shadows twisted like they knew I was watching.

“Vasha...?”

No answer.

I turned—half frantic, half frozen—and there she was.

Curled up on the other side of the bed, clothes messy, mouth slightly open in that completely unfair “hot and adorable even while unconscious” way. Fast asleep. Breathing slow. Safe.

My breath hitched like a skipped audio file.

Not gone. She wasn’t gone.

The pressure in my chest didn’t vanish, but it eased, just enough to suck in air like I wasn’t drowning anymore. I reached out and wrapped myself around her like a limpet with separation anxiety, pressing my cheek to her back, anchoring myself to her presence.

My heart was still racing. Loud. So loud I could hear it in my ears, like a damn subwoofer jammed into my ribcage.

I didn’t know what the hell that was. No dream. No vision. No warning.

Just... something horrible brushing up against me in the dark.

And I never wanted to feel it again.