#Mando’a project

[ranahan]

Which format is better? The appendix will contain every single instance of a particular morpheme grouped by morpheme, so does adding more examples clarify anything or just clutter up things?

[ranahan]

My analysis project would probably qualify as working on my PhD in Mando’a.

tried explaining star wars fandom to my dad and settled on the simile that sw is too big and fucked up to know everything and you sort of have to choose a major like mando lore studies or jedi lineage trees and then we all come together but do not get along just like real academia. anyway what’s ur major

[bits-and-babs]

Hey darling! Finally sending an ask, that link list inspired me haha. Pretty please can I have Din Djarin x mirror sex but specifically the mirror being a reflection from a piece of his armour across the room👀

Thanks in advance, love you long time 💕

𝐍𝐀𝐑𝐂𝐈𝐒𝐒𝐔𝐒 — 𝐃𝐈𝐍 𝐃𝐉𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐍

» PAIRING : The Mandalorian x f!Reader

» CONTENTS : Sexy reflections, p in v sex, cream pie (wrap it, guys, I mean it), overstimulation, filthy Mando talk, use of Mando’a. 18+, ya nasties.

» DIN MASTERLIST : here || MAIN MASTERLIST : here

You know he can see you, that he’s noticed exactly what occupies your attention. Perhaps it’s shallow of you that you continue to have such an affinity for the armour even after all this time. His smooth, reflective breastplate gleams in the twin sunlight of Tatooine like a polished jewel, your face projected back to you on the surface.

The Mandalorian is observant. You are confident he’s twigged the way you never quite look into his visor, instead occupied by your own face staring back at you in the gouged ‘cheekbones’ of his helmet. He would often clear his throat to recapture your attention when you found yourself momentarily distracted by the mirror image in his chest plate.

Yes, you were aware of how it looked. It appeared self-obsessed, narcissistic even, but you couldn’t shake the vivid daydream that occupied your mind, rattling around while Mando spoke and drowning out his soft, husky voice.

Stars, you wanted to fuck him. Every waking moment of the day, you were consumed by your own arousal for The Mandalorian, all triggered by one solitary thought a few weeks ago when you had caught your reflection in his pauldron.

‘I’d be able to watch him fuck me’.

The salacious thought, previously only an intrusive yet fleeting imaginary scenario, had grown into a devastatingly consuming addiction. You imagined it, his chest plate reflecting his thick, ruddy cock spearing into you, your thighs slick with your own cum and glistening on the surface of the armour. How you’d see your own body tremble and writhe against the hangar floor, overcome by the arousal he drew from you and arching your ba-

“Hey,” Mando’s ever so slightly frustrated tone rips you from your scandalous daydream, rocking you back into reality. Overcome with embarrassment, you feel your skin burn hot under his questioning gaze. “You’re not listening.”

“I’m so sorry,” you speak quietly, and stars you mean it. It’s mortifying, being caught out like this. It’s easy to wonder if Mando thinks you consider yourself an Alderani princess, contemplating all the ways you can style your hair to be the most eligible at the Festival of Light ball.

“Do you-… Do you want to explain what the problem is?” He dares to ask, The Mandalorian’s voice lilting with mild concern, as though he’s concerned you may request to take his armour for yourself.

If only it were that simple.

“… It’s the reflection.” Your admittance makes Mando stop, his immovable helmet expression staring blankly at you in question. It was agonising. He wants you to spell it out to him.

You sigh heavily.

“I want-“

His cock splits you open, sinking deep inside of you and forcing you open around his girth. You sob out, arousal blooming through your nervous system as you watch the tears drip down your cheeks.

Mando had heard your ridiculous admittance with an open mind, answering simply by removing his breastplate. The click of the latch unlocking made your hairs stand on end, helplessly watching as he stood the armour up at the head of the tiny cot.

“Eyes on your reflection.”

He has you on your hands and knees, his gloves nipping at the skin of your bare hips. Mando hadn’t removed any other item of clothing, pulling his cock out of his flight-suit pants and immediately pushing inside of you.

“Ohhhfuck!” You squeak, his length sinking inside of you almost too easily, considering how little prep you’d been granted. The ridges of his cock push up against the sensitive spots inside of you, and you watch as your jaw drops at the overwhelming sensation.

“So wet. Do you walk around like this for me all the time?” He speaks. The modulator does little to hide the strain in his voice when your walls clamp down on him, desperate for more. “Leaking down your thighs for me, Sarad.”

You wail softly, staring at the reflection of The Mandalorian as his hips begin to rock forward and into you. His undulating body looks long and broad in the mirror image of the beskar armour. The rippling muscles of his abdomen flex and curl underneath the thin canvas of his black flight suit.

“Stars,” you wheeze as he suddenly picks up the pace, your fingers gripping tightly onto the bed sheets on the cot. Mando’s tentative testing seems to end, his hips picking up speed and force when he finds the confidence he will not hurt you.

Arching your back, you push your hips back into his thrusts. It sets off a string of grunts and groans from The Mandalorian. “Fuck- you’re so tight around me, Sarad. So tight and f-fucking wet.”

It’s so unusual for him; words usually buried deep unless absolutely necessary. You’re unsure you’ve ever heard him talk so much, his voice growing louder with each slap of his skin against the curve of your ass.

“Fuck- I’d… I’d let you ruin my armour with this pretty pussy,” he rambles, hands squeezing at every handful of flesh he can; your hips, your ass, your waist and breasts. “You can gr-hngg grind against it, mark it up with how wet you are. Make you lick it off-“

“Mando!” You choke out, each syllable of his utterly filthy words pulsing through you and blurring your vision of the chest plate with the tears that well in your eyes.

“Stars, just- Just mark me up with that pretty cunt. Stain my tassets. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Get to watch as you drag it over my beskar-“

You’re seeing double, the vision of Mando fucking into you at a mind-numbing pace making you light-headed. You can feel it build, feel it grow and tease at the edges of your body.

“I-I’m gunna c-ughhhh!”

Mando simply reaches around you, pushing the leather-clad pad of his thumb against your clit.

The supernova that blasts through you burns your muscles as they clamp down around him, sobbing loudly and forcing your eyes open to witness your writhing body in the outline of the armour.

Mando’s hips stutter in the image projected back to you, and you both watch and feel him bury deep inside you, cumming with a trembling groan. His palm splays across your lower back, pressing your upper body down against the mattress and continuing to fuck you through the obliterating overstimulation that follows.

Credits:

— Gif Credits unknown- let me know so I can tag you!

— Mandalorian divider created by me using Picsart stickers.

-

[vytels]

More dinluke, codywan time travel fic stuff

So, if you’ve read the fic so far, Din and Wolffe are vode. Plo took one look at Din and was like I’m adopting him lol

So basically, I’m just imagining how’d the two would interact in other things outside of the story

Like dealing with droids? They’re gleeful and bashing the shit out of them, they’re two feral dogs going to town on a piece of meat. You don’t wanna mess with them. They’re on a mission.

What’s the mission? Only they know.

Broken caf machine? Din’s trying to fix it (miserably failing) while Wolffe curses his own existence and spirals so deeply down the Mando’a curse word pipeline that he doesn’t remember Basic

Wolffe meets Grogu? Din’s a proud father while Wolffe can’t get over the fact it’s a tiny baby Yoda that’s actually really cute. He’s astounded and calls Grogu “little warrior”, probably tries to see if the eating-frogs thing is true or not

Wolffe totally would sick the Wolfpack on Din at any given notice. Just be like “here, baby sit these fools for me” or be like “this shiny needs brotherly attention, I’m busy, please give it to them”. Din would be okay with it, maybe a little annoyed, but he’s going to go full Mandalorian and teach them their “heritage” as best he can.

If they’re able to comm each other, it’s just insults back and forth with the occasional short conversation. Like:

Wolffe: sha’buir

Din: di’kut

Wolffe: Cody said you need to go to the bridge

Din: he can tell me himself

Wolffe: osi’kovid

Din: Cody told me that he wants you to know that he’s going to eat your socks

Wolffe: what? He did not

Din: you can’t prove he didn’t

Wolffe: sha’buir

Cody is so done with the two of them because Wolffe just boasts about Din in the command group chat and is about to throw them both out a window or something

Luke’s all for it, he wants his husband to have more friends that don’t actually wanna beat the shit out of him at any given moment

Anyways, link to the fic:

[wannab-urs]

Pedro Pascal Character Fanfiction Recs | Vol 34

AO3 | Kofi | Main Masterlist | The Spreadsheet Masterlist

Howdy folks!

Welcome to the Spreadsheet Digest, my weekly(ish) fic rec post. This is everything I read in the last two weeks. I was on a bit of a Din kick, but fear not, there are other boys here too.

All info provided by the author unless it was blank, in which case I filled it in.

Fic Recs Below!

lost, found

Dieter one shot by @sp00kymulderr

When Dieter is hurt by the words of someone else, he turns to his art to help him. What he really needs is you.

homophobia, unsupportive family, bad family relationships, drug use, alcohol use, implied poly relationship, sex mentions, angst angst angst. There is an ezra in this, whether he is our ezra or not is up to you. writer projecting their emotions on to their favourite character.

Well it's love, make it hurt

Din series by @corazondebeskar-reads

After The Mandalorian begrudgingly teamed up with you for a big-ticket bounty, you find you work surprisingly well together, and you propose a short-term partnership. Weeks become months, and your hunting partnership becomes muddled as you explore a new dynamic onboard the Razor Crest.

BDSM, d/s dynamics, dom/sub dynamics, s/m dynamics, sadism, masochism, bondage, bounty hunting, canon-typical violence, descriptions of injury, p in v unprotected sex, oral sex (m&f receiving), anal, toys, impact play, spanking, use of "sir," no y/n, all chapter titles are taking back sunday lyrics, explicit consent, aftercare, big meat Mando, soft dom din, din djarin removes the helmet but does not reveal his face

you've been a bad girl

Din one shot by @beskarandblasters

You’ve been a bad girl and Din decides to punish you by keeping you on a collar and leash

canon divergent (long live the Razor Crest), dom/sub, degradation, pet names (good girl, cyar’ika), vaginal sex, unprotected sex, creampie, praising, no use of y/n

sorgan girls are easy

Din one shot by @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin

Din gets off to a pretty girl he met in the past

male masturbation, PIV (past), infidelity (past), hair pulling (past)

Rescue Me

Din series by @charnelhouse

Mando rescues a girl and develops a life-ruining crush.

Innocence kink. Age Gap. Smut. Screwing someone to get the other out of their head trope. Loss of Virginity (a tad bit of blood). Fluids. Dirty talk. Angst. Smut. semi-public sex. language. ptsd. fluff.

sweaty hands, reluctant hearts

Din one shot by 221bshrlocked (AO3)

He never thought the day would come when he’d hear you saying you wanted to leave (him). Yes there was an understanding between the two of you that you were hired to help him care for the Child and to somehow keep the Razor Crest alive and working. And he knew it made sense for you to find work elsewhere now that the Razor Crest was destroyed and the Child was with his own kind. But he just assumed you weren’t going to leave considering it’s been a couple of months since he’d given the kid to the Jedi and you never brought it up. It hurt hearing you say those words, especially when he realized he wasn’t meant to hear them and that you were confiding in Cobb Vanth of all people. Turns out, all Mando needed was to see the Marshal eye-fucking you as you fixed the new ship and overshared your thoughts for him to snap and finally make a move. Hopefully he can change your mind…

angst, smut, jealous mando, the helmet comes off, rough sex, penetrative sex, oral sex, breeding kink, slight exhibitionism, sweaty sex, overstimulation, squirting, dirty talk, sweet talk, mando’a, shy/fluffy mando, touch starved, post season 2 - no grogu, some non con elements due to overstimulation, but everyone is consenting.

i wonder if you stopped his world like you stopped mine

Frankie one shot by @chronically-ghosted

watching the woman he loves be with someone else is killing him, but for your sake, he manages. But when Benny's birthday loosens him up, he can't help but bear his soul over a phone call. Too bad you don't pick up and he's forced to leave the evidence in a voicemail.

pining, light angst, idiots in love, country music as a catalyst, romance, tw alcohol, tw drinking, hangovers, ultimately very fluffy

ruthless

Joel one shot by @whatsnewalycat

Joel is essentially your step dad and he catches you sneaking out instead of manning the radio like you're supposed to... so he punishes you.

DDDNE, literally just a fucked up stepdad/mom's bf fantasy, could read "mom" as tess but I don't name her or assign physical features to her or reader, post-outbreak, reader is def over 18 but not by much so yeah age gap, NON-CONSENSUAL, power imbalance, unethical d/s dynamic, slapping, spanking, punishment, orgasm delay/denial, humiliation, degradation, face fucking, anal sex, little to no aftercare

the warmth of your gaze, the lingering of your touch

Joel one shot by @beskarandblasters

After an evening out with Joel you come home to go to bed together, leading to some other activities before the night ends.

reader is disabled and uses a wheelchair, no outbreak AU, Joel can lift reader, fingering, oral sex, praising, vaginal sex, unprotected sex, creampie, pet names (darlin’, pretty girl, baby, angel), fluff, no use of y/n

undercover

Tim Rockford series by @secretelephanttattoo

It's been 20 years since you left LAPD and stopped answering his calls. What happens when you partner up again after all this time?

Idiots who won't admit their feelings. Or if we're being polite: friends to ex-friends to work partners to lovers. Miscommunication. Slow burn romance with eventual explicit smut. The holsters come with their own warning. the dressDave Yorkseries@janaispunkYou’re having an affair with Dave York. When he takes you on a week-long vacation, you realize that you have deeper feelings for him than you should. explicit smut (18+ only, mdni), angst, infidelity, fluff, somewhat questionable relationship dynamics, dom/sub dynamics, dom!dave, sub!reader, able-bodied reader, dave pulls her hair, no use of y/n, idiots in love, more specific warnings at the start of each chapter

the dress

Dave York series by @janaispunk

You’re having an affair with Dave York. When he takes you on a week-long vacation, you realize that you have deeper feelings for him than you should.

explicit smut (18+ only, mdni), angst, infidelity, fluff, somewhat questionable relationship dynamics, dom/sub dynamics, dom!dave, sub!reader, able-bodied reader, dave pulls her hair, no use of y/n, idiots in love, more specific warnings at the start of each chapter

My Recent Fics

Trust - Din Djarin x gn!reader - season 2 finale drabble (prompt fill)

Ravage - Ezra x f!Reader - saltburn AU, vampire scene

Only Good Girls - Dave x f!reader - D/s, punishment, mirror sex

Happy Reading!

[stars-n-spice]

KHEA + TBB:

A little look into the dynamics Khea shares with each member of the Bad Batch!

Khea + Wrecker:

Opposites attract - they’re nearly opposites in every way but they make it work

Slow burn baby because Khea took forever to open up and admit to her feelings, but thankfully Wrecker is patient

Wrecker keeps her grounded and is her voice of reason, he's there to reassure her that things are okay

Fuck, if they don't love explosions and causing a scene - they can be reckless as hell and it's advised not to leave them alone together or they will get into trouble

Khea is not used to men who wear their heart on their sleeve so finding out Wrecker was genuine in his affections and promises threw her in for a loop

Since Khea isn't a verbal person about her feelings, it's great that Wrecker has such a high emotional intelligence and can just tell when something's wrong and it's even better for her because he knows what to do when he does sense something is wong

In return, Khea always makes sure that Wrecker is looking out for himself because she realizes he's the glue holding the team together and doesn't give time for himself, so she makes sure that every now and then he takes a break from everything

Wrecker fell first, Khea fell harder.

Hunter + Khea:

Khea takes great joy in teasing Hunter at any chance she gets (all in good fun of course) because she claims it's her 'right' as the younger sister-in-law to do so

Khea will never admit to how much she respects/thinks highly of him as both a leader and older brother

Khea has a bad habit of stealing Hunter’s things (both intentionally and unintentionally)

Hunter is the other one outside of Wrecker who makes her feel like she's not as closed of a book as she thought she was because he can always sense when something's wrong but unlike Wrecker he doesn't know how to go about it to try and make her feel better

They both have sensory issues (yippee) and bond over that; giving each other tips and whatnot to avoid being overstimulated in dire situations

Khea's always there to help Hunter out with Omega whenever he needs it (especially with 'girl' things)

One of Khea's favorite things to do is give Hunter crap about him not tying up his hair because she thinks it's impractical to have it all out while under the helmet or when fighting

Khea + Echo:

Next to Wrecker, Echo is the closest Khea is to out of the group

Was the first of the Batch that Khea actually opened up to and he was the first one to hear about what happened with her brothers

Khea sorta sees Echo as the older brother she never got to have; one that's patient and kind with her but also makes sure to keep her in check

Bond over the trauma of losing their brothers + the guilt over not being able to save them

Echo gives her tough love often and will call her out on her bullshit, constantly pushing herself to be better and to take care of herself in healthier ways

Khea calls Echo "Eyayah" - which means 'Echo' in Mando'a

Echo lets Khea work on his prosthetics and Khea has made adjustments/attachments of various sorts for him

Kama buddies :) (sometimes Khea takes his kama on "accident")

Khea + Tech:

Both are big nerds, Khea's just more subtle about it

Their interactions are either them talking each other’s ears off or working in complete silence on projects next to each other

Tech does not understand how or why Khea is with Wrecker but since they’re both happy, he’s happy

Tech is learning Mando’a from her

Sometimes will butt heads and will passive-aggressively ignore each other until they’re forced to make amends (i.e. Wrecker makes them apologize to each other)

Like when they fight, they FIGHT; both hate admitting to being wrong whenever they come into conflict with each other and it's like bone on bone. It's never anything physical, it's always emotional and verbal assaults

Tech likes to point out things about Khea that Khea will adamantly deny or ignore because it pisses Tech off (i.e. Tech telling her she is nearsighted and should get some glasses or something and her insisting she's fine and it's okay to see things a little blurry sometimes)

Both are incredibly blunt people and maybe probably are on the spectrum one way or another (another thing Khea will deny when Tech points it out)

Khea + Crosshair:

Both are little shits

Crosshair takes his role as the 'annoying younger brother-in-law' VERY seriously

Took some time for them to warm up to each other once Crosshair was reunited with his family (He didn't know what to make of her let alone how Wrecker managed to pull her)

Khea only knew so much about him from the others (Wrecker and Omega occasionally told her things about him) but decided she'd try and be nice to him should she ever meet him but that went right out the door when he pointed out she was a little short for a Mandalorian

Would rather be caught dead than getting along in front of Wrecker because he will cry tears of happiness

They love to hate each other and their competitive personalities make them clash ALL the time (which can be both amusing and irritating depending on the situation)

Crosshair learns about Khea's brothers and the things she went through from Wrecker and after that, he's a little more understanding and compassionate with her

Khea drinks and Crosshair smokes; they like to poke fun at each other for who is going to die first from their bad coping mechanisms

Khea + Omega:

Khea and Omega both see each other as sisters (neither of them knows what it’s like to have one)

Tag team when it comes to raising Hunter’s stress levels (all in good fun)

Khea is fiercely protective of Omega as she kinda sees her as a “Mitcan Redo” - she would, can, and has killed for the kid

Omega was the one who got Khea to open up a little more to their squad (was also the first to pick up on how she felt about Wrecker and vice versa)

Omega is really interested in Mando culture and Khea takes delight and pride in telling her stories and teaching her things during their time off

Khea likes to tease Hunter and say that she's going to make Omega a Foundling (Omega loves the idea) and has promised to one day get Omega some beskar and maybe even a helmet if she wants it

Omega made her a little charm of a star that she wears on a necklace and totally didn't cry when Omega gifted it to her, nope

Khea sometimes finds herself incredibly frustrated over Omega's situation and wishes that someday Omega will get the chance to just be a kid and enjoy life without having to worry about things no child should have to worry about

[ranahan]

I’m semi-seriously thinking of digging another old conlang project of mine out of naphthalene, stripping off the flesh, taking the bones out, redressing the skeleton in Mando’a, and seeing if the resulting Frankenstein’s monster would walk.

Incidentally, that project was also a language for a warrior culture and had a lot of Chinese influence (especially verbs). Other influences included military slang from Finnish and other languages and several historical non-English creoles, pidgins and trade languages. I also intended it to be easily learned as a second language, have simple grammar, and be an eminently practical language for eminently practical people—and yet it still came out unexpectedly poetic, like Mando’a.

Mando’a isn’t a conlang Mando’a is a vocabulary list with a few possessives thrown in

[transitranger327]

Foundations (Ehn’yuste Ch. 5)

Summary: To build a new Jedi order, Jetii Mando’ayust, the Wrens will need two things: a Temple and more members. They make new friends to get the former, and connect with old friends to find the latter.

Notes: A 3.8k word chapter because y’all have been so patient waiting for this (and because I wrote the beginning and the end before the middle). I’m also posting this on my fiancée’s birthday while we’re on our 5-year anniversary trip. She wants me to hurry up and post it so we can go back to cuddling.

As always, a Mando’a glossary is at the end. Read it on Ao3 or below the cut

—

One and a half years after the Ignition

The apartment door slid open. Sabine inhaled the scent of searing meat and sautéing vegetables. Her wife’s cooking skills had blossomed in the past few months, now that she was no longer constantly on the run nor isolated on a sparsely populated world. An array of spices bloomed in the pan, collected from various worlds Shin had visited. Sabine tried teasing them apart, but could only identify catabar and pepper out of the menagerie. The splattering of liquids reducing in the pan was not loud enough to keep their guests—a fair-skinned man and a darker-skinned woman—from chatting with Shin as Sabine made her way across their karyai. She embraced her beloved from behind and offered a cheek kiss, “Hey beautiful, I missed you.”

“I missed you too,” Shin replied with her own kiss, “can you grab the wine for me?” It was across the room, on the table, but distance was rather trivial when you could use the Force. As her wife offered her the bottle, she introduced the couple. “This is Tyrus Vizsla, current Duke of clan Vizsla, and his wife Mirli.”

“Tyrus and Mirli, huh?” Sabine asked, greeting the Vizslas. “Your parents were interested in the Old Republic Wars?”

Mirli was the first to speak up, “No, actually, we picked the names ourselves.”

The implication was rather obvious to Sabine. “Of course, that’s why I didn’t recognize you. Welcome to the home of Clan Wren.”

“Vor entye for inviting us.” Tyrus did his best to navigate the weird formal-informal meeting that was taking place. He was a Duke meeting with a Countess for the first time, but Sabine was more blasé than nearly any Mandalorian he had met. “Tonight was perfect, Ragnar is staying over with some of his friends from school.”

“Oh, so you’re the ones taking care of him now?” Sabine had heard the tale of Paz Vizsla single-handedly fighting Moff Gideon’s forces, and was glad to meet those that were now taking care of his son. 

“While we may not have agreed with his father, he’s still a Vizsla. We don’t abandon our own.” Mirli seemed to emphasize this more than most Mandalorians, but Sabine was nodding in agreement.

—

After starting dinner and regaling the Vizslas with the Wren’s travels on Peridea, the point of the meeting came to a head with Tyrus asking “so why did you invite us here?”

The big question. Well, not the big question (that was the one Sabine was going to ask the Vizslas), but certainly a big question. So she started laying it out. “Shin and I are planning on starting a new Jedi Order. A Mandalorian Jedi Order. Jetii Mando’ayust” 

The Vizslas were curious. Mirli queried, “That’s certainly interesting, but how does that relate to us?”

“Eventually, this apartment will not be big enough,” Shin continued her wife’s proposition, “We want to establish a…temple, of sorts. A place to train, offer sanctuary, and have a library dedicated to Mandalorian and Jedi knowledge.”

“We want to build it at the only place on Mandalore that’s strong in the Force.” Sabine took a deep breath, “The childhood home of Tarre Vizsla.” Mirli and Tyrus had paused eating. “It’s in a part of Sundari that’s still in ruins. We just…”

Shin saw her wife faltering, and cut in. “We wanted your permission to use it.”

There was a long pause. Tyrus leaned back in his chair while Mirli began twirling her fork between her fingers. 

“That’s a big ask” was his answer. “I don’t hate it tho” was hers.

“Can you elaborate?” Sabine asked.

“Tyrus wants to keep the clan from infighting,” Mirli offered. “There’s trouble brewing between traditionalists and modernizers. Again.”

“I personally think it’s a good idea.” Tyrus’ look was difficult for the Wrens to parse. “You two have proven yourselves true Mando’ade, dedicated to us all. But I’m not sure that’s enough for some.” 

Shin queried, “Is there something that would…ease the minds of everyone else?”

“Maybe,” Mirli mused, “if they knew what you were doing was…shukenla sa val.”

“Like they had a stake in what you were proposing,” Tyrus added.

The two Jedi exchanged glances. “I think I know what you mean,” replied Sabine, “and we can certainly make that happen.”

“Ori’jate,” Tyrus declared, “It’s settled then.”

Mirli agreed. “Now, how about another glass of wine while you tell us more stories from far-off galaxies?”

—

Sabine slipped under the covers next to her wife. “I’m glad dinner went well.”

“I’m surprised you wanted to ask.” Shin dragged Sabine’s arm over her chest to nestle in with her. “You’re normally the ‘forgiveness, not permission’ type.”

Sabine playfully rebuked, “This is a big deal!”

“Just think of all the problems you all could’ve solved by doing this first instead of drawing blasters.”

“What does ‘this’ mean?” Sabine quipped, “cuddling each other?”

Shin softly chuckled. “Hmmmm that definitely would solve some problems—and create a few new ones.” Her wife joined her in the quiet laughter.

—

Before they could drift off to sleep, a loud chime rang out from their apartment computer system. “Shin, honey, didn’t you turn on ‘do not disturb’?”

“Yeah, but I left on notifications for family emergencies, like always.”

Sabine was a little annoyed, but she dragged a datapad out from her nightstand anyway. A smiling icon of Omega Hazard projected onto her eyes. She opened the holo. 

Sabine, sorry to bother you, but one of my best friends is missing. I think he was kidnapped by the Empire. New Republic won’t help. Meet me here soon. 

A set of galactic coordinates were embedded in the message, an old clone trick to keep locations hidden from less savvy spectators. 

“Forgive me, cyar, for not keeping your extended family straight, but Omega is a friend of Hera’s, right?”

Sabine snorted, “More like dated Hera.” She reminisced about the rebellion years when Omega slept in Hera’s room on the Ghost.

“And she wasn’t at the wedding because…”

“She and her wife Lyana were having a baby.”

“Right, right, they stopped by a month ago. Little baby Rex.” Shin tried to stop her wife from crawling out of bed. “Honey, we can call back in the morning.”

But Sabine was already suiting up. “I’m not gonna be able to sleep if I don’t do anything now.” She saw her Shin’s pleading eyes. “Come on, riduur, we can sleep on the Wolf. It’ll be like old times.”

“Fine, but you owe me,” Shin groaned. “Some kisses…and more when we get back.”

Sabine knelt down, and rested her forehead against Shin’s. “Gar serim, my love.” She showered her with a few more kisses before dragging her out of bed.

—

Four Years before the Ignition

“Are you sure you want to leave?”

“The Empire’s gone, Omega, we’re free to go wherever we want.”

Omega and Jax were sitting in the cockpit of Omega’s tried-and-true shuttle, the Oh-Too. 

“I’m surprised you, of all people, want to stay here. You were a pilot for the rebellion, you saved the Galaxy, you should be living it up in the Core.”

“I saved the Galaxy so there would be a here to come back to. To protect my family, including you.”

“Okay, okay, I get it, family is important. But I found out that I still have family out there. I have a cousin running a small shop on Pippip 3, he asked me to come work with him. It’s my first real connection to what I lost.”

Omega finally relented, and began running her pre-flight checklist.

—

One and a half years after the Ignition

In truth, the Mandalorians didn’t sleep particularly well on the Wolf either. The bunks were a bit too small to fit both together, and they had forgotten how much sleeping together calmed their anxieties and fears. 

So they talked thru the mission, planning for how to move forward after meeting Omega. Reaching out to contacts in and adjacent to the Empire, trying to figure out why Omega’s friend was kidnapped in the first place, where to eat with her once they got there. Eventually they tired out, but the sleep they fell into was the restless kind, like unaccustomed sailors in rough waters. 

The ramp lowered, and the two women groggily descended. A third was waiting for them at the landing zone. Her trademark blonde hair was in an undercut, but a teal streak now lined the left edge, contrasting the bright red hair tie which kept the ensemble in place. This all, however, registered to Sabine as a blur of color charging at and hugging her. 

“Thank you for coming so fast!” Her voice was ragged with concern

“Omega, I’m—” Sabine’s grumpiness abated when she sensed the genuine despair in Omega’s voice “—a little tired but we’re here for you.”

“Did you not…oh…did I call you at night?” 

Shin chimed in to rescue, “Don’t worry about us or when you called, you’re on the family emergency list.”

Omega broke her long hug with Sabine, and moved to embrace Shin. “Thank you, thank you,” her voice becoming more stable. 

“Can you tell us more of what happened, and who we’re looking for?” asked Sabine. 

A deep breath. “We’re looking for Jax. He’s one of the kids who was experimented on at Tantiss. He didn’t show up to our holo-gamenight. Sami said that they were messaging the night before, but none of us could reach him that day. So I came here and found his house a mess.”

“Can you show us?” Shin asked. 

“This way.”

As the three women walked the streets of Pippip 3’s 27th-largest town, Shin kept vigilant for signs of past struggles. Sabine, on the other hand, was trying to figure out why the New Republic wasn’t interested in helping. “I’m surprised Hera wouldn’t help you, of all people.”

“I asked both Hera and Rex to help, but apparently when they ran it up their chains of command it got shut down. Apparently there are higher-ups in the New Republic who don’t think we should devote any time to rumors of the Empire.”

“So why would the Empire want to kidnap your friend?” Shin hoped that would tell her more about how the abduction happened.

“Jax and the others in our holo-gamenight all had high m-counts.”

A “Karabast” emerged from Sabine’s lips while several more swears came out of Shin.

“Now you see why I’m so worried.”

Sabine was now fully alert. “We need to get to Jax’s house iviin’yc.”

—

Despite the untarnished exterior, the two Jedi could feel something was wrong with the house. All events left signatures in the Force, but most were too weak to be felt even by experienced Jedi. Conflict and death, on the other hand, left gashes in it.

“Give you the chills, doesn’t it?” asked Omega, as she prepared a datapad. 

Shin and Sabine shot suspicious glances to each other.

“Here, take a look,” Omega held out her datapad, “the lock was sliced into, the door wasn’t broken in.”

Sabine took a look at the slicing program. “Definitely Imperial.”

The door opened, and what they found inside was nothing like the outside. The entire house was trashed. Possessions smashed, drawers rifled thru, furniture in disarray. The Force here reeked of hurt.

And worst of all, a Mirialan man lay dead, crumpled on the floor as if tossed around by a squad of stormtroopers. The two Jedi knelt down next to him, trying to understand his last moments. 

Those were pure, unadulterated fear.

“That’s Jax’s cousin, Rindenn,” Omega informed the others. “He ran a tack & feed shop in this city, and Jax moved here to help him out.”

Sabine got up and inspected all the rooms of the house, trying to find any clues about the kidnappers’ whereabouts. Dropped equipment, blaster shots indicative of academy training, a stray thought in the Force, anything. She pulled out a holo-imager to record everything undisturbed.

But these Imperials were tidy. Not even a spare tibanna magazine or busted comlink could be found. 

When Sabine returned to the main room, she found Omega weeping in Shin’s arms. 

“I told him that we’d always watch each other’s backs.”

Her emotions washed over Sabine as she drew near and hugged both.

“This isn’t your fault,” soothed Shin.

“You did the right thing calling us,” reassured Sabine.

—

24-hour diners were a common sight on planets with lots of interstellar traffic, staying perpetually open regardless of how long a world’s local day. On an agriworld in the Outer Rim, however, they tended to be rare outside of the major ports. 

The three women had managed to find the only one in the city. Not that they needed the odd hours (it was the middle of the afternoon, local time), but because Omega needed dinner and the Jedi were craving breakfast.

While they waited for their food, Shin was mainlining the cheap caf and sending messages to her old contacts in the Empire. None of them knew she had defected (whatever that means for a mercenary) to the Jedi, and she hoped that none suspected it either.

Sabine, on the other hand, was catching up with Omega. “So how’s everyone on Pabu? Well, I hope?”

“Lyana’s busy as always, lots of things to do as mayor.” She smiled, thinking of her wife, “But she loves doing it. And it gives me lots of time with little Rexy.” She pulled up a holo-recording of baby Rex, rolling round and laughing with his moms and uncles.

“He is absolutely adorable. Who did you hand him off to today?”

“Well I gave him to Hunter, but I think Crosshair will put him to bed tonight if Lyana doesn’t.”

This intrigued Sabine. “Does Hunter have something going on?”

“He plays Sabacc on Taungsday evenings.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the waiter arriving with their food: Fried Nerf Steak for Omega, Lessu Omelette for Sabine, Alsakan Toast for Shin. 

As the other two began to dig in, Shin gave them her preliminary results. “It looks like the Empire has been shuttling around their best biotech researchers. Basically never keeping them in one spot for long.”

“So even if we had their location, we couldn’t scout it out beforehand.” Omega always had an eye for tactical issues. 

Sabine frowned. “They would absolutely move their research if they discovered we knew.”

“And we may have tipped our hand,” Shin continued, “My high-clearance contact was very suspicious when I asked. They said it was classified.”

“What do the troopers think?” Omega asked. 

“My low-level contacts all seem to think there’s a research facility in the Galactic West, the Unknown Regions.”

“Karabast. There’s no way…” Sabine trailed off, a new idea taking shape. 

“Oh no,” Shin was between bites of bread, “I know that look.”

“What moonyo-brained idea do you have now?” Omega asked. 

“Huyang said that Jedi used to control hyperdrives with the Force to travel to uncharted systems. When navicomputers got better, they mostly stopped except to get to Ilum.”

“Which is in the Unknown Regions.” Shin thought she knew where Sabine was going. “Except we don’t know if the lab Jax is at is on Ilum.” 

“The old masters used their connection to Ilum to reach it, right? We have someone here who is connected to Jax.”

Omega tried making sense of what she was hearing. “Is that something Jedi can do? Jump to a person just thru the Force?”

Shin tried to keep Omega from getting her hopes up. “Force-assisted jumps are difficult, and they require deep knowledge of where the traveler is going. No one has ever done it looking for just a person before.”

“Just because no one’s done it before doesn’t make it impossible.” Sabine needed Omega’s hopes up. Hope is a powerful tool in the Force. “Riduur, you and I know the technique. Omega, you know the target. I can connect the three of us to fly.”

“This is incredibly reckless.”

“My plans usually are,” Sabine grinned. “But It’s our best bet.”

“Well, I’m always in to save family.”

“Omega, you said you were in a secure research facility. How many people did you need to help you escape.”

“Crosshair and I escaped alone once. But to destroy the base and rescue every prisoner, it took three of my brothers, plus my sister defecting.”

“You think a dozen Mandalorians could do the trick?”

“Definitely.”

Shin was rolling her eyes (affectionately) the whole time the others cooked up this scheme. “Fine, I’ll call up the Duchess and see if she can get a dozen volunteers.”

“Wait. Call the Vizslas first.” Sabine turned to Omega. “Go home. Grab your armor, weapons, and any object that connects you to Jax. Keepsakes, photos, tools, anything.”

—

Tyrus Vizsla was never much of a late-night guy. He preferred the cool breeze of a quiet Concordian morning to the evening events his wife frequented. A solitary stroll thru Sundari was the next best thing.

His quiet, however, was broken by an incoming call from Clan Wren.

“Su cuy'gar, Tyrus. You said that you wanted a stake in this new Jedi order?”

“Why do you ask?

“We have an opportunity for you. And it involves killing some imperials.”

—

Blind jumps are dangerous things, bordering on stupidity. Many a pilot met their end by jumping without calculation in a desperate move to escape. The Force, of course, made things marginally safer. While Sabine only knew the theory behind Force-assisted jumps, Shin had actually made a few: a short round-trip visit to Ilum with her old master (the Imperial installation there immediately sent them packing), and once when she used it to escape pirates who had destroyed her navicomputer. The whole technique was based on reaching out to a place in the Force, something so personal and intimately known that you can feel every inch of it on the back of your hand. 

She’d never done one for a stranger.

They were sitting in the cockpit of Tyrus Vizsla’s Mandalorian dropship—the Buir’tra, he called it. “And you’re sure this is safe?” he asked.

“Hell no,” answered Sabine, “but when have Mandalorians ever stopped doing something because it wasn’t safe?”

He merely shrugged. “Ni vercopaani kaysh brali.”

As Shin began slipping into her contemplative trance, Sabine offered some surprisingly simple instructions. “Okay Omega, I need you to start meditating and focus on Jax.” 

A holo-image of several teenagers sprang up from a comlink. Omega began twirling a lock pick in her right hand, then paused and picked up a carved statuette in her left. Shin felt Omega’s presence on the meditative plane grow.

Then Sabine joined, and their souls were aflame.

Memories, past and future, ripped thru their veins—and they witnessed.

Shin reached out, and threw them into hyperspace.

—

Baarpir bal beskar—sweat and iron. That’s how Mandalore grows. 

When strangers offer theirs to work with you, Mandalore grows. When you spend yours to protect others, Mandalore grows.

They’re also the smell of preparation for the fight. Before the blood and burn and mud and mayhem take over. 

Sixteen warriors had joined the three women. Two members of Clan Rook, Din Djarin, two members of Clan Kryze, and eleven members of Clan Vizsla. Tyrus was flying, while Mirli discussed the raiding plans with Shin, Sabine, and Omega. 

Nineteen suits of armor. Blaster, detonator, saber. One mission. 

Anti-aircraft cannons spat flak at the Buir’tra, to no avail. The Mandalorians would not be stopped so easily. Return fire cleared the perimeter of guards and damaged the defence towers. The assailants would have a clear path to all entrances. 

The doors opened up beneath them, and eighteen souls dropped onto the surface. Detonators disintegrated the base’s doors. Sparks and shot filled the corridors of this secret installation. Computers were sliced into, stripping all their secrets. 

Level 3, room 9 appeared on every helmet’s display.

Half the group stayed on ground level: seven to maintain their exit, Sabine and Djarin to find the base’s leader. Two more stayed in the stairwell to prevent being cut off. Shin, Omega, Mirli, and four more Vizslas descended to the final level, determined to find Jax alive. 

His experimentation room was locked. Shin’s sword made quick work of the door. But what they found inside was horrifying.

Jax was on the brink of death, heartbeat weak on the monitor. Two butchers were standing over him, cruelly keeping him conscious as they extracted his spinal fluid.

These Imperial scientists were promptly shot.

Omega began removing the vertebral needles, closing up the wounds. She demanded sedatives and analgesics from the group, who began scouring the cabinets for any medications. Shin sliced all the straps off the bed, freeing the patient. 

“Omega, you found me.”

“Save your strength. We’re getting you out of here.” 

Omega asked if there was any synthetic blood on the Buir’tra. Orar Vizsla, a medic in training, nodded. Omega injected Jax with the anesthetics that were found, knowing they wouldn’t have much an effect until he got a transfusion.

A message from Sabine: destroy the research, all levels. 

Omega and Orar moved Jax to a hover-stretcher. Mirli and two commandos began planting detonators throughout Level 3. Shin and another commando ascended to assist the stairwell crew in doing the same to Level 2. 

The stretcher crew was escorted to the door. Sabine, Djarin (carrying a computer core), and the chief scientist (in binders) joined. The six made a break for the the Buir’tra, which had made another pass over the base to set down twenty meters from the entrance. None of the straggling stormtroopers dared shoot at their chief scientist.

Safely aboard, Orar began digging out the medical supplies. Omega deduced Jax would need 4 standard units. Transfusion commenced. Heartbeat strengthened. Breathing steadied.

Sabine grew impatient waiting for Shin to make it back. She stunned the chief scientist, and ran back into the compound, saber ablaze.

As she re-entered, she heard Shin call for backup on Level 2. 

No time to run down the stairs, jumping is faster. The door had been sealed, but it was no match for a determined Jedi. A small detachment followed her thru the breach. 

“Hey boys!” 

The stormtroopers were caught off-guard. Their flurry of blaster fire was sent right back at them. 

“Well, what are you waiting for? Come on, let’s go.”

Shin’s smile could be felt thru her helmet. “Waiting for you, of course.”

The excitement in the air could be smelled, a mission nearly finished. As this final group made their way out of the research station, more and more of the strike team joined them. The feeling of victory swelled as they reached their exit. 

Jetpacks lit. The Buir’tra began taking off. Drop doors open, Mandalorians coming in the way they went out. 

There were now twenty-one souls on the dropship. 

Not a single loss. 

They watched as the detonators simultaneously triggered, the research base rapidly disassembling before their eyes. Several hoots and hollers emerged from the team.

A pair of exhausted Jedi entered the cockpit, ready to jump back to the known galaxy.

—

Notes: I will neither confirm nor deny Omega’s force-sensitivity Tyrus & Mirli are T4T, Orar is nonbinary Moonyos are the monkey-like animals native to Pabu

Mando’a Glossary: Vor entye: “Thank you” lit. “I accept a debt” Jetii Mando’ayust: “Jedi in the Way of Mandalore” Mando’ade: “children of Mandalore” shukenla sa val: the true meaning is lost when translated, word-for-word it’s “partly” “as/like” “them” Ori’jate: “very good” cyar: “love” riduur: “spouse” Gar serim: “that’s it”, lit. “you’re right” iviin’yc: “fast” Su cuy'gar: “Hello!” lit. “So you're still alive.” Buir’tra: Mother Sky, tho Mando’a has no gender Ni vercopaani kaysh brali: “I hope this works” lit. “I hope it succeeds”

[ranahan]

Canon Mando’a analysis: project outline

Idk, if anyone is curious about what I’m cooking?

I’ll probably re-title and split and merge and move chapters around several times before I’m happy, but the idea is it might look something like this:

Mando’a Phonology

Appendices

Phonetic transcription of Jesse Harlin’s Republic Commando Soundtrack lyrics

Phonology of Jesse Harlin’s Mando’a: vocabulary, phonemic inventory, phonotactics

Phonetic transcriptions of Karen Traviss’s audio recordings

Comparison of Traviss’ glossary ortography, glossary pronunciation, and recorded pronunciation

Phoneme inventory

Phonotactic analysis

Stress analysis

Not necessarily organised in exactly this fashion, but approximately this content.

Mando’a Morphology

Appendices

Tables (so many tables: roots, affixes, compound noun types & couple of specific issues will be covered, but idk yet how these are going to be organised most logically)

Interlinear gloss of Republic Commando Soundtrack lyrics

Mando’a Derivational Dictionary

Now split apart from Mando’a Morphology

Mando’a Syntax

?

Appendices

Interlinear gloss of Republic Commando Soundtrack lyrics (same as above in Morphology)

Interlinear gloss of Traviss’s published Mando’a sentences

Whoops, my hand slipped? That’s about all I can say for myself. 😂

[handspunyarns]

You Were Marked: Days Twenty-Seven to Twenty-Nine (Din, Part II).

pairing: din djarin x *reverse age-gap* *plus-size* fem!O/C       

word count: 7.4K   

chapter summary: Din returns to Unmanarall to search for Marathel. 

warnings:  angst, medical emergency, animal death, mention of physical illness / blood / violence / murder / suicide / rape / child rape / child sexual abuse / child death / object rape, English and Mando’a cursing      

***Please feel free to comment, kvetch, or otherwise speak your mind about my work. ***   

You Were Marked: Masterlist      

You Were Marked: <- Previous Chapter 

Din had the sudden sensation that a TIE fighter crash-landed on his chest, and he lurched upward towards what he believed was the excessively rude pilot who apparently couldn’t land worth a damn, uttering a gurgling rebuke as he grabbed his blaster. 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, WHOA!” yelled the pilot. 

“I’ll blast you both apart!” shouted Din, leaning on his elbow and alternating his blaster between the two men who hovered over him, his brain misfiring in every direction. 

One of the men, wearing a light blue uniform, looked at the spent hypos in his hand and muttered, “Holy shit, I can’t believe that worked.” 

Din’s heart pounded painfully in his chest, and he groaned.  “What happened? Where am I? Who are you?  Are we enemies?  Where’s Marathel?” demanded Din of the man wearing an X-wing uniform. 

The X-wing pilot held up his hands, and said, “Okay … Let me take those one at a time.  You had … a cardiac-type … episode.  We gave you a series of hypos for that.  We didn’t expect you to react so quickly, though.”  The pilot took a breath.  “You’re on your ship.  When you didn’t answer our hails following your distress call, we tractored your ship on board the Luisitz.”  Din stared at the pilot.  The pilot continued, “Yeah, it’s a dumb name for a ship.”   

Din lowered his blaster, not because he felt safer, but because he couldn’t hold his arm up anymore.  He was also too weak to keep himself up on his elbow, so he lay back down on the floor.  The pilot visibly relaxed, and the man in blue — who was apparently a medic — held a scanner over Din’s chest.   

The pilot continued, “That there is Corpsman Ka’nab.”  The medic waved. Din nodded slightly in response.  “I’m Captain Carson Teva.” 

Din grunted.  “My name is …” 

“Din Djarin.  Guild Bounty Hunter, Mandalorian.  Yeah, we scanned you.  Got your chip.”  Teva pulled out his holopad.  “Going back to your original questions, I can safely say I sure as hell don’t want to be your enemy.  And as far as where is Marathel … I can’t say, because I don’t know who Marathel is.  Is Marathel your cat?” 

“My what?” 

“Your cat, or whatever pet you have on board.  Look, you said you were the only one on board, but we scanned your ship as we tractored it in…” — Din groaned inwardly — “… and there’s obviously a second, small, life-form aboard, but it’s in a shielded portion of the ship.”  Din remained silent.  “Hey, if I could have a pet in my X-wing, I would.   So what is it?” 

“A … pet, yes.” Sorry, kid.  “Not Marathel.  She’s …” 

“That her?” Teva pointed at the console, and Din looked up to see that his holopad was now projecting the image Cobb had sent.  Din nodded, and grunted in the affirmative.  “Pretty.  Heading out to see her, Djarin?” 

“Something like that.  Am I done, now?  May I go?” 

The medic said, “If you can sit up on your own, now, I’m done with you.” Din slowly pushed himself up and shifted so he could lean against the console.  He looked down at himself and saw that the medic had pulled off his pauldrons and cuirass, and had sliced his flight jacket and his underthermal open to get at his bare chest, which had several adhesive sensors stuck to it.  Din looked at the medic.  “Hey, I only know not to remove a Mandalorian’s helmet. That, I did not do.  You can take off those stickers yourself, and chuck them out.  Captain, I’ll send you my report.” 

“Was it a heart attack?” asked Din. 

The medic frowned.  “No … not as such.” 

“Not as such?” 

“Well, your blood pressure went to zero and your heart rate was spiking at 200.  But the scans showed no heart damage whatsoever.  Then you had some sort of seizure, like maybe you shot a clot through your heart into your brain, but nothing showed on neurological scans.  So the only idea I had was to hypo you with what I would use on someone who was having a heart attack and a neurological seizure.”  Din turned his head to look at Teva, who shrugged and continued tapping on his holopad.  Din returned his gaze to the medic.  “Hey, it worked.  And I removed that bacta bandage you were wearing, you obviously didn’t need it.” 

Din looked down at his chest again, looking for the bite mark … which was gone.  Not just healed, but gone, as if he’d never been bitten at all.  “What the …” Din looked up at the medic.  “What did you do?” 

The medic and Teva exchanged glances.  “I … removed a bandage.  If you had a wound under there, it’s obviously healed now.”  The medic tossed his equipment into his bag.  “I think I’m done here.  Safe travels, sir.  May the Force be with you.”  The medic left. 

“This is the way,” muttered Din as he looked again where the bite wound had been, looking for a pale scar, anything that would prove that Marathel had bitten him.  “It’s like … it never happened.” 

“Are you sure you were wounded, Djarin?” asked Teva, leaning in to look closer at Din’s chest. 

Din looked up at Teva, then hurriedly closed his thermal shirt and flight jacket over his bare skin.  The helmet was the most important part, but bare skin in general was still … difficult.  Even in a medical emergency.  “Would you believe that I had a human bite there?” 

Teva went back to his holopad and chuckled.  “This Marathel of yours gave you a what-for, did she?  Or was it … your pet?” 

“My … pet … is not human.” 

“Djarin …” 

“Mando is fine,” snapped Din. 

“… Mando, look, I don’t care.  I only care about weirdness on my patrol, and you brought me weirdness.  For the second time, I’m pretty sure.  You’re one long way from Nevarro.  And from Maldo Kreis.” 

“So are you, Captain.” 

Teva chuckled again.  “I said it first.” 

Din looked up at the holo of Marathel.  It occurred to him that he’d only seen her looking like this for seven days. Seven days.  He’d known her almost three times as long in her injured state.  It felt almost unfair. Which Marathel did I fall in love with?  Was it the Marathel with the clear skin and the bright eyes, who called him Bounty Hunter and baked him bread?  Or was it the Marathel who almost died in his arms and had nearly lost all her blood twice?   

Whichever Marathel it was, she had given him his first kiss with a woman.  And had broken his heart over and over and over.  And had gotten him the closest to not only removing his helmet, but to leaving his Creed altogether. 

Teva noticed Din staring at the holo.  “Tell me about her.” 

“It’s complicated.” 

Teva nodded.  “It always is.  Believe me, I  understand.” 

Din considered the Dahls and a lifetime of torture starting with being sired by a murderous pervert. He sighed and said, “No, Captain, I don’t think you do.”  He looked back at Teva, who was still tapping on his holopad.  “Aren’t you done, yet?” 

“Not even close.  I would have fewer reports to process if you’d died.  But then, I would have never known that lovely woman’s name,” he said, pointing at the holo.  “And I’d also have to be responsible for your … ‘cat’. 

Din went back to looking at Marathel’s holo.  “Captain, let me ask you something. Say … say someone found a planet where women and girls … little girls … have been generationally tortured in the most reprehensible ways.  Just how many need to suffer, or die, before the New Republic does something?” 

“Is it a Republic or Empire-era planet?” 

“Dank ferrik,” grunted Din.  “Are you taking the piss?” 

“I wish I were, Mando.  So which is it?” 

“It’s neither.  The settlement is the only site of civilization on the entire planet.  Everywhere else is … inhabited only by animals. But there might be artifacts from other planets within this settlement.  And let’s say that one of those artifacts was … Old Republic.” 

Teva frowned at Din.  “Where is this planet?” 

“I’m only speaking hypothetically, Captain.” 

“How many hypothetical generations are we talking about?” 

“Possibly two thousand Basic years.” 

“Kriff.”  Teva pinched the bridge of his nose.  “Little girls.  How young?” 

Din swallowed.  “Her first memories.” 

Teva’s eyes flicked up to Marathel’s holo, then he harrumphed.  “Have you ever heard that there’s always three ways to do things in the military?  There’s the official way, the right way, and then there’s the way that us grunts take care of things.”  He did some final taps on his holopad, then stood up.  “It sounds like you know about the official answer to your query.” 

“Primitive culture … blah blah blah.” 

“Blah blah blah, indeed.  Now, the way that a grunt — like myself — would take care of this … l would search for any artifacts on this hypothetical planet that give a clue where these hypothetical people might have come from, originally.  That might be enough for some … hearsay … to get in the right ear, for the right thing to happen.”  Teva sighed, and shook his head before he held out his hand to help Din up from the floor.  “My report is good enough for government work.  Let me see what I can do to speed up your release.” 

Din nodded. “Thank you, Captain.” 

“You’re welcome, Mando.  May the Force be with you.” Teva stepped on the ladder out of the cockpit.  “Don’t forget to get your pet out of the hold.  And, uh … keep me updated on this hypothetical planet of yours.” 

Shortly after that, the Razor Crest launched and exited the landing tunnel of the Luisitz, Din thinking to himself that it was indeed a ridiculous name for a ship.  He set the coordinates back to Unmanarall, and throttled into hyperspace. 

Once they were set on their way, Din dropped out of the cockpit and pulled the access panel open.  “Kid?  You can come out now.”  He heard Grogu chattering, and then the boy jumped out of the access panel and into Din’s arms, bawling.  Din was still unsteady after experiencing whatever it was that had happened to him, and he sat down hard on the floor, hugging Grogu.  “It’s okay, kid.  I’m okay.  Everything’s okay.  We’re going to get Mama back.  We’re on our way to Mama.” 

“Mamaaaaaaa…” wailed the tearful Grogu, and Din would have rather cut off his arm than to see Grogu cry.  “Bah daws! Bah daws!” 

“Bad Dahls, you got that right, buddy.  We’re gonna show those bad Dahls a thing or two.” 

Grogu stared at Din with his tearful eyes, runny nose, and trembling lip.  After a couple of hitches, the child quietly asked, “Patu … Mama?” 

Din sighed, and found a cloth to wipe Grogu’s nose.  “Blow,” said Din, and Grogu complied. “Ad’ika … I wish I knew what to tell you about Patu Mama.  The first thing to do is to go back and find Mama. We’re on our way back now.  We don’t know what we’re going to find when we go back, so we need to be ready for anything.  It’s time to be Mandalorians. This is the way.”  Grogu made a bleat in the affirmative, but still looked incredibly sad. 

With the time skips his mind had taken, Din figured they had a day or so to get back to Unmanarall.  He stripped off his sliced jacket and thermal shirt and inspected the damage.  He had some needle skills, but he didn’t think even Marathel could fix this. Din noticed that this jacket was one that Marathel had embroidered the Mudhorn signet, so he ripped off the embroidered pocket and deposited it into the bin with his other keepsakes.  Getting full in there, he thought.  He rolled up the cut shirt and jacket and shoved them down the back of his clothing bin, still loath to toss out something Marathel had held in her hands, despite his confusion regarding his feelings for her.  He grabbed a clean thermal shirt and gathered it in his hands to pull over his head when his eye caught the yarn bracelet he’d bought. He’d originally intended to give it to Marathel.  Now, he decided he’d wear it until it fell off, or until he and Marathel figured out just what the shab there was between them … if anything. 

One thing at a time.  For now. 

Din redressed and collected all his armor.  He cleaned and polished every surface and every crevasse of every piece of armor, saying each Mando’a incantation out loud. He did this not only for his own benefit, but also for Grogu’s, for it was high time the boy started learning these things.  Din used one of the new felted wool cloths Marathel had made, and perhaps he was biased, but he thought the handmade cloth was far superior to anything he could have purchased for the task. 

That chore completed, Din then moved on to his weapons.  He’d been far too distracted recently, and he hadn’t been maintaining his weapons cache as he should have.  Ni ceta, Manda’lor.  He dismantled each weapon in his armory, cleaning, polishing, and calibrating each part to working perfection.  He even tinkered a bit with his antique bolt blaster and vibro-blade, both inherited from his buir.  Both weapons had been handed down in buir’s family for several generations.   

When Din was a boy and still relatively new under buir’s care, buir had taken him out to the canyon the covert used as a shooting range, and let him fire the old bolt blaster.  It was the first time Din had handled a weapon, and the recoil landed him right on his ass. Once buir stopped laughing, he began weapons training with Din.  Buir had been the most patient of teachers, and it was his calm and positive reinforcement that Din always tried to emulate as he passed on the Mandalorian traditions to Grogu.   

By the time the chores were completed, there were only a few hours to go until the Crest reached Unmanarall.  Din made bone broth for both himself and Grogu, and they split a ration bar.  Din decided that they both could use a nap, to be fresh for whatever awaited them when they returned to Marathel’s planet. Din put his feet up on the console, and Grogu curled up against him, murmuring Mama before he dozed off.   

Din projected Marathel’s image again —the one that Cobb sent — and he stared at it for a while.  Din worked out what she had been doing at the time this image was captured.  Marathel was making bread at the palace while all the others watched and did their best to convince her to not return to Unmanarall.  He was the only one not there.  She had revealed to him her sad life, and he had rejected her because of it.  But he’d always known, deep in his heart, the depth of her lifelong suffering, who her father was, but he wouldn’t admit it to himself.  He’d been such an unmitigated asshole to her.  All she’d wanted was kindness.  He’d granted her some kindness, but not enough.  Only enough to suit him.  Only enough so that he could remain comfortably within his Creed. 

Din absently put his hand over the bite mark — scratch that — where the bite mark used to be.  Okay, why did the bite mark burn like I’d been dipped in lava, sending me into a ‘cardiac episode’ … and then disappear? 

The bite mark burned on the second night of the Dahl’s mating, and then in the Hold, when Marathel told him to be still.  Actually, any time she told him to be still. Din had believed that she controlled him through the bite mark, which … might be only partially true.  She had told him to be still in order to make him remove his weapons, so that she could sacrifice herself.  To make him take her back, and to leave her behind, in essence, to sacrifice herself again.  And she made him be still to prove to him she was nothing more than a … body to be used for his pleasure. 

The other times the bite had burned, he’d attacked her, brutalized her, frightened her, both awake and in his dreams.  But in all those times, she never told him to be still … instead, she begged him to let her go. 

But if she controlled me, why would she beg me to let her go? She could have just told me to do that!  And once I’d taken her back, then why would the bite still burn?  Why did I forget her?  And why don’t I … love her anymore, for kriff’s sake! 

Did I have a not-a-heart-attack and lose a scar because … Marathel is now …? 

Din flat-out refused to complete that thought.  He refused to believe it even if he did.  So, instead, he decided to follow his buir’s advice:  take a nap; things will be clearer when you wake up.  It wasn’t until he was an adult that he realized what buir was actually saying: kid, shut the fuck up for a while; I need to rest my eyes.  Din gently patted Grogu’s back and watched the little green boy sleep until Din dozed off himself. 

Din woke up to the hyperspace alarm going off.  We’re here.  We’re back, Marathel.  You told me to leave you here and not come back, but I’m not one for following orders. And I’m thinking about ignoring your request to not take revenge on that Hold.  Especially if you broke the promise you made to me and leapt off that cliff after all.   

Din dropped the Crest out of hyperspace above the planet, and his thoughts about the best way to reduce the Hold to rubble were suddenly stopped.  He had entered orbit just above the Hold coordinates, and the atmosphere above that point was a cloud of grey smoke.  The shab?  Din looked down at Grogu, who looked back up at him, asking, “Mama?” 

“Looks like Mama’s been busy, kid. Hold on.” 

Din circled the Crest into the atmosphere and landed where he had the first time he’d been here. It was pointless to prevent Grogu from going with him; the boy was in his floating pram and waiting by the ramp door before Din could get out of his chair.  As they made their way to the Hold gate, Din could smell something distinctly chemical in the air.  He associated it with hot springs and geysers, which confused him as he did not recall this odor here before.  They came out of the woods to see the large wooden gate leaning against the stone pilaster, and part of the stone wall collapsed.  But these sights didn’t confuse Din as much as what he didn’t see, and that was the Round Building. 

As Din stepped through the gateway, he could now see the where the Round Building had been was now a smoldering ring of rubble, blown from the center out.  Dank ferrik; Marathel didn’t mess around.  As he came forward, he heard a couple of shrieks and noticed some women scattering at the sight of him.  One came forward, braver than the others.  The blonde woman wore a light green gown that was torn and dirty … a Duke, thought Din.  “You ... You came back.”  She held what looked like a fireplace poker in front of her.  “Stay back, metal man.  You brought her back; are you here to finish us off?” 

“I wish you no harm, madam, I am only looking for Marathel.” 

To Din’s surprise, another nearby woman, this one with the curly black hair of a Captain, spat on the ground.  “The Belwhyn bitch wrought this destruction.  She and her demon creatures have killed us all.”  This woman wandered off, wringing her hands and muttering. 

Din returned his attention to the woman in green, asking, “Did she mean the Dahls?” 

The blonde woman nodded, and lowered her poker.  “They came in after her … we knew she’d gone into the Round Building, looking to kill the Elders.  The building began to burn.  The men were running out.  But she’d left the gate open, and all the Dahls ran in, running straight to the men trying to escape the fire, and killed them all.  Men were going back inside, preferring to burn than to face the wrath of the Dahls.  The Dahls ripped them limb from limb.  Then ... they went after the children ...”  The young woman sobbed.  “The children.  The babies.  Gone.  The children ran to us for protection.  The Dahls snatched them from us, and killed them too.”  The woman continued to cry. 

“All the children?” 

“Just the boys.” 

Din looked at the destruction around him.  Bodies — parts of bodies — were still everywhere.  Women wept, holding the corpses of infants.  One, he saw, no longer had a head; but the woman cooed to it as if it were still living.  Two other women were gathering remains of men to put into another pyre.  A little girl, hardly larger than Grogu, helped the two women, carrying smaller human parts: a hand, something that looked like a child’s leg.  Other females merely sat on the ground, rocking, their faces blank slates of horror.  Grogu whimpered in his pram.   

“So it’s true.” 

Din startled; he had been focusing on the destruction around him.  “I beg your pardon?” 

The blonde woman pointed at Grogu.  “Olba said you had a child with you.  She only saw it from a distance.  She said it was sweet.  And green.  And Marathel loved it.”  She sniffled.  “My boys are dead.” 

Din reached out to the woman in green and she recoiled from his hand, brandishing the poker again. “Please, good lady, can you tell me what happened to the Round Building?” 

The woman spread her arms wide.  “Big boom.” 

“Why did that happen?” 

“Marathel.”  The woman looked at his visor again.  “You’re the one that brought her to the Hold.  You took her away, and the marchwyl.  I was whipped, because I wouldn’t tell them it was Hylma who stole the marchwyl, even though I was glad it was gone.  But the others ...” The woman’s voice dropped to a whisper.  “Others told.  Then the Elders killed Olba and Hylma and Tymfy and Lorica.   They’d brought her out, they’d taken the marchwyl, and she still had the Dilimgau.  The Elders do not suffer thievery,  but… I’m glad the Dilimgau is also gone.” 

Din wasn’t sure whether this woman was going to remain relatively calm or not.  So far, she’d been very helpful, but she was also using the same flat, unemotional tone of voice that Marathel used when she catalogued the terrible things the men did to her.  This woman seemed to be unafraid of him as well as Grogu, and she didn’t seem to want to use that poker on him, and he wanted to keep it that way.  “Marathel is not here now?” 

The woman scrubbed her nose with the back of her hand.  “She left and took the Dahls with her.”  Din was relieved to hear that at least Marathel left here under her own steam.  Then Grogu quietly whimpered Mama, which startled the woman.  “That thing can speak?  It can say mama?”   She dropped the poker and sat down on the ground, weeping.  “I’m not a mama anymore.” 

Din knelt in front of her, not wanting to get closer.  “I am so sorry.”  He let her cry for a few moments before he asked, “Madam, may I look through the debris?” 

The woman looked at him in confusion, as if she’d never been spoken to with deference before, which was most likely the case.  “Why?” 

“I want to help you.  I can tell people to come and help you.” 

The woman frowned at him.  “Come from where?” 

Din pointed skyward.  “From up there.  You saw my flying metal box?  There are others out there, many others, and I think your people came from somewhere else, long ago.  I need to find some evidence of where your people might have come from.”   

The blonde woman looked around her in despair.  “We are beyond help.  We are all dead.  No more men means no more babies.  Some women have killed themselves already.”  She began weeping once more, and dropped her poker on the ground. 

Din muttered apologies again, but moved away from the blonde woman as quickly as he could towards the wreckage of the Round Building.  Grogu stuck close and remained quiet, seemingly affected by everything around him.  Din leaned over and touched his head to Grogu’s.  “I know, kid.  Some very bad things happened here.  But no one will hurt you.  I promise.”  Grogu looked dubious.   

Din peered down into the hole left by the apparent explosion.  The chemical smell here was much stronger, and burned Din’s nose.  Grogu began coughing, so Din closed the pram lid, and sealed his helmet.  The smell was familiar, somehow, but he couldn’t quite place it.  He carefully stepped down into the crater, sliding down what must have been a large door.  There seemed to be a lot more metallic debris in the crater than he anticipated.  He’d figured this building had been constructed of stone and wood, which it was, but it appeared that there was a large metal component. 

The blast had obviously disintegrated the stone, and the wood had burned away, but the interior layer of the Round Building had been sheet metal that broke apart in panels, curling against the intense heat that had occurred from the fire. He moved towards the center of the crater, balancing carefully on the rubble.  He turned in a circle, finally realizing that this building was not engineered in a circle, but was built around a metal cylinder. Din pulled out his holopad and began taking stills.   

There is no way these people made a metal cylinder this large.  They don’t have the means to make sheet metal like this. 

Din moved towards a section that was still fairly intact and attached to other pieces.  Riveted together.  

It’s a ship.  This was a ship. 

Din nearly pumped his fist in the air.  He had been right, after all.  He got closer to what was undoubtedly part of a fuselage when some markings caught his eye.  Bending down, he wiped some soot off the wall and saw what was unmistakably Aurebesh lettering.  He could only make out a couple of letters, however. 

Din then looked down to his feet, and he could see a sublevel below him.  He picked his way to an area he could access, and dropped down.  The flat surface he landed on shifted under his feet, and the section began to fall further into the hole, so he fired his jetpack so he would not fall with it.  As he lifted into the air, he noticed some of the women shrieking and running again at the sight of him flying.  Din sighed, remembering how jumpy Marathel had been when she first saw him and Grogu.  He took a few holo stills from this vantage point, as it showed the fuselage/building well.  A panel had fallen inward, and from here he could now see lettering on it, in both Aurebesh and an old script he did not recognize, but the inscription was obviously the name board of this ship: 

DRESO LLONG’WYR  SYSTEM LEW’EL 

Lew’el.  They came from the Lew’el system!  There was also a string of numbers, and Din was unsure if it was the old style dating system, or the ship’s registration, but in any case, it was old.   

Din then noticed several round objects behind the building, near the uprooted tree, the tree Marathel had nearly fallen out of.  He touched back down to the ground, picking up one of the round objects, recognizing it immediately as a lid for a chemical storage barrel.  There were quite a few of them on this side of the wreckage, making Din think that the blast was more directional than just up.  As he dropped the lid, he noticed that his glove was coated with a blue-grey dust.  What the … Mist?  He looked over the area around him, and realized that this whole side of the building was covered with Mist dust.  Why in Frith were they … 

“Are you a machine?” 

Din had not been expecting to hear a voice, and he whirled around to see a small girl standing behind him.  She was a sweet-looking child, with long brown hair that was seriously in need of a good brushing.  She also had large, dark brown eyes and a face full of dirt.  Her dark green tunic and skirt were stained and torn,  and her bare feet were utterly filthy. If he’d been running around this dirty at her age, his mother would have had a conniption and hosed him off in the front garden.  His buir, meanwhile, would have simply drop-kicked him into the river.  “No, child, I am a person.” 

“Why are you made of metal?” 

Remembering that Marathel didn’t understand the concept of religion, he said, “My people wear armor and a helmet.  Those are the rules my people live by.” 

Seemingly satisfied with this explanation, the little girl said, “Belwhyn Marathel did all this.”  Din nodded.  “The Elders made her a Belwhyn because she fucked you, and she was only supposed to be fucked by the Bishop.”  Din could not reply, as he was stunned by these words coming from this little girl.  She didn’t seem to mind, as she went on without prompting.  “I was there when they made her a Belwhyn.  She screamed as they all fucked her.  The Captain kicked the Dilimgau into her cunt.” 

“… What?” 

“She came back and killed them all.  The Bishop is over there,” the little girl said, pointing.  “I was supposed to be the Hunter’s Whyn,  but he’s dead now.  I was branded and everything.  See?”  The child lifted up her skirt to show Din, and she was naked under her skirt. He turned away as she exposed herself to him. 

“Lower your skirt, child,” Din muttered. 

“But I don’t have an Elder anymore.  Are you going to be my Elder?” 

“No.” 

The girl dropped her skirt and began to cry.  “But … I’m supposed to suck your cock now, aren’t I?” 

Din backed up from her.  “No.  No!  Go back to the women, child.  Just … get away from me.”  The girl ran away, crying at being rejected by him, leaving Din feeling both repulsed and saddened.  Mostly repulsed.  It made him think of Marathel’s brand, made him think of her as a child just like the little Hunter girl.  No wonder Marathel was so damaged in her mind. And hearing that the Captain had … His hands curled into fists, and he wished the Captain was still alive so he could kill him.  Din considered burning down the rest of the Hold and killing the remaining survivors as a mercy to them.  He took a deep, shuddering breath, knowing that he could not do that.  Perhaps these women could be rehabilitated ... Perhaps their minds could be repaired ... 

Perhaps I could just give up my Creed and join a traveling underwater circus! 

Din lined up several barrel lids and took holos.  He believed he had enough.  Now he needed to find Marathel.  He walked around the fallen tree and back out to where the women still milled around.  He didn’t see the little girl, and he was thankful for that.  Din approached Grogu’s pram, still closed, and he gently maneuvered it away from the fallen Round Building.  “Kid?  Are you okay in there?”  He heard some shuffling inside.  “Knock once for yes and twice for no.  Are you doing okay in there?”  There was a light, single tap from within.  “Okay, buddy, just stay in there a little longer, alright?”  Another tap.   

Din looked over the yard again.  Nearby was a dead body that was oddly enough, still intact.  He went over and looked down at the corpse of the Bishop.  His eyes were gone, and his mouth was open and full of blood.  There were multiple stab wounds all over his body, a couple right in his crotch.  Too good for you, you son of a bitch.  Rapist.  Child rapist.  You carved a gash down a beautiful woman’s face.  You destroyed her before she was even born.  You broke her mind so much she dreamed I was you! And I wish you could come back to life so I could kill you myself, you … “MOTHERFUCKER HU’TUUN!” growled Din as he drew both blasters and alternated firing shots into the corpse, over and over.  Din holstered his blasters, reared back, and kicked the corpse in the groin.  He then raised his helmet enough to spit in the corpse’s eye socket before stepping back and setting it on fire with his flame thrower.   

Finished now, Din turned, placed his hand on Grogu’s pram, and walked them both out of the Hold gate, not looking back at the women and girls who stood staring at him.  “C’mon, kid, let’s go find your Mama.” 

Din decided to return to Marathel’s hut on the Crest.  On a normal hunt, he’d leave his ship where it was and walk.  He liked having the time to settle his thoughts, make a plan, and creep up on his mark quietly.  Right now, however, he felt the need to hurry.  Although Marathel walked out of the Hold, he wasn’t sure how long ago she did that, which direction she was going, or what state she was in when she left.  The rest of the women were still shell-shocked by the explosion and the Dahl’s attack, but they didn’t go on a rampage like Marathel had, fighting off and killing however many men. 

Din and Grogu went back to the Crest, lifted off, and touched back down in the grassy field just outside Marathel’s yard.  From here he could not see anything too out of the ordinary, but as he and Grogu approached, he could see that the brown panels Marathel had hung were no longer there.  Then he saw her bag lying on the ground where she’d dropped it.  Hoping she may be still in the hut, Din hurried forward but stopped short at the four rounded piles of flowers.   

Four.  The four women who brought her out.   

“Stay here, Grogu,” muttered Din.  He went up to the steps.  There was a burned-out torch — Marathel must have intended to burn the hut down — a whetstone, and bloodied footprints.  He looked up to the ridge pole to see the four ropes the women had been hanged from.  He did not wish to unwrap the women to see what they had suffered. More of Marathel’s footprints went through the large blood spill under the four shroud-wrapped bodies.  Din could smell the decay of flesh, and flies buzzed everywhere. 

Olba, Tymfy, Lorica, Hylma.  I am so sorry.  Ni ceta.  Thank you for being good women to Marathel.  Thank you, Olba, for mothering Marathel the best you could.   

Din took a step back and chanted the Mando’a prayer for the dead, something he hadn’t spoken since the death of his buir.  He believed these women were fully deserving of this honor, and that Manda’lor would accept their souls for their sacrifice.  This completed, Din stepped up into the hut.  He decided that there were certain items that he needed to collect before he left this place.  He rummaged around until he found what he wanted as well as a bag to carry the items in. 

Din stood in the center of the hut and looked around one last time, feeling as if he were seeing ghosts of lifetimes past: Marathel cooking at the fire, Marathel playing with Grogu, Marathel in his arms.  He took one last look at the post near the corner.  Her leaning post.  He closed his eyes, took a breath, and walked down the steps to the yard.  Once there, he turned, aimed his flame thrower, and set the hut ablaze. 

Din stood for a few minutes, watching the hut burn.  The roof thatching went up like a rocket, and soon it collapsed, leaving just a burning shell of posts.  Now, he was finished here.  As he and Grogu returned to the Crest, Din snagged Marathel’s bag, hoping that she would need it back.   

Din flew the Crest low, searching for life signs on the scanner and wondering where she would go.  How far could she get?  Din assumed she was injured in some way; Marathel was not a trained warrior and had probably been running on adrenaline.  He felt fairly sure that she was heading for the cliff, but he had no idea where this particular cliff was.  It was within running distance from her hut, he knew that.  Grogu stood on the console, peering through the view screen as Din followed the coastline, searching for this cliff of hers.   

The scanner began beeping.  Din looked at the monitor to see a large convergence of life signs coming up ahead of them.  As they got closer, the sensor picked up one single additional weak life sign.  Din steered the Crest in from the high ledge, fifty or so meters above the crashing waves.  The ledge was a mostly a grassy field with the foliage growing right up to the edge of the cliff.  There was a large, flat boulder some ways away from the edge.  Din was thinking he could see a couple of small objects on the boulder, when Grogu suddenly shouted “Mama!” 

Din immediately brought down the Crest, and was out of his chair before the ship had fully settled, and practically leapt through the ramp door.  He ran to the boulder, where he saw a cracked wooden cup, the remains of a spear, and a bloody handprint.  Din immediately panicked, thinking, damn you, Marathel, you promised me you wouldn’t kill yourself! You promised me that you would live out the rest of your days on this fucking rock! I promised I wouldn’t take any revenge, and I promised that I would leave you behind.  Well, I broke both of those promises and you’ve broken yours.  We are just a fucking pair, aren’t we? 

Din flicked the heat sensor on his helmet, and detected a life sign a few meters away.  He ran over as fast as he could, sliding to a stop next to the crumpled form of Marathel.  She lay in a heap, not far from the dead body of Rodanthe.   Marathel’s arms were twisted beneath her as she half-curled into a fetal position.   Under her hips was a pool of thick, half-dried blood.  No, not again, thought Din as he leaned over her, touching her exposed and sunburned cheek with his gloved finger.  Her eyelids flickered, and Din whispered, “Oh, ma’mwsh ha’laa.”  He couldn’t tell where she was injured or where the blood pool had come from, but she wasn’t dead, oh, thank you, thank you, she’s not dead. 

Din carefully turned her over, realizing that her collarbone was broken and her shoulder was dislocated. She had a gash on the side of her head, with maggots in the wound. She was terribly sunburned where her skin was exposed. How long had she been out here?  But before he could fully assess any of her injuries, he heard Grogu cry out, “Patu!  Bah Daws!” 

Din straightened up, seeing Grogu standing on the flat boulder, pointing at the tree line at the edge of the grassy field.  He looked at the tree line, and the heat sensor on his helmet showed many signatures, many living creatures, and they were coming straight for him.  Din ran forward, brandishing his blaster as hundreds of Dahls charged.  He skidded to a halt, firing at several Dahls, killing them, causing the creatures to trip over each other, but still they came.  Din holstered his blaster and fired his flame thrower, but he’d been fire-happy recently and he could only swing the flame once along the front line of the Dahls before he ran out of fuel.  It did, however, bring them to a stop, and they stood their ground, chattering their keh-keh noises at him, clawing at the dirt. 

Din screamed at the Dahls, “Get away from her, you fuckers! You leave her alone! You’ve taken her entire life away! Get out of her head, get out of my head, and leave us both alone!”  He grabbed both blasters,  shot several more times at the feet of the closest ones, and the pack began to move backwards.  “That’s right, you back the fuck up and LET HER GO!” 

Unfortunately, this infuriated the Dahls, and they charged forward at Din once more.  He lifted his blasters again, intending to strafe the front line for as long as his blasters held out, when the Dahls simply stopped, as if they were crashing into an invisible barrier.  Yelping in pain, the Dahls clawed at the air, at each other, confused.  Din was just as confused as the Dahls, and he looked back over his shoulder to see Grogu holding out his little hands, holding back the Dahls with the Force.  Din returned his attention to the Dahls, who were backing up once more, now fearful of the metal man and the little green creature. 

“Go away from here!  Get out of her head and leave her alone. You’ve had her for thirty years!  You’re done with her now. She doesn’t want you anymore. You let her SUFFER!  You NEVER loved her!  NOW LET US GO!” 

Snapping, hissing, the Dahls continued their retreat as Grogu released the Force barrier and sat down in exhaustion.  Din kept his stance, brandishing both blasters, firing a warning shot at the feet of any Dahls that attempted a forward move.  Eventually, the Dahls disappeared back into the tree line, but Din held his ground until the creatures were out of range of his visor’s sensors. 

Din slowly backed up himself, scanning the tree line for any sudden movement, until he was back within range of Marathel.  Holstering his blasters, he turned to Grogu, sitting on the boulder.  “You okay, kid?”  Grogu bleated weakly.  “You did good, buddy, I’m proud of you.”  Din went to one knee beside Rodanthe, hoping that at least this one last Dahl had been true to Marathel.  He stroked the animal’s head, wondering if his cardiac episode had occurred at the time of her death.  If so, then what was the reason for him to lose his love for Marathel? 

Not having any answers, Din decided that the best course of action was to care for the still-living woman.  He carefully lifted Marathel from the ground and carried her to the boulder where Grogu sat.  “Hey kid, grab that cup and spear, would you?” asked Din, figuring that if Marathel meant them as a suicide note, they were important to her.  Grogu did as his Patu asked, and looked up wearily at Din.  Din nodded his head at the ship and said, “Going my way, pal?  Hop on.  Mama won’t mind, I don’t think.” 

Grogu leapt into Marathel’s lap, whimpering Mama, curling against her.  Din carried them both into the Razor Crest, closing the ramp behind him.  The Dahls moved forward again to the tree line, and watched as the small ship lifted off the ground, and winked away into the sky, leaving Unmanarall for what Din hoped was the final time. 

Day Twenty-Nine point Five ->

[apatheticblues]

NEW FIC: He Strung Me Up

Fox was always angry. His rage was in a constant simmer just below the surface of his skin; it was sometimes frighteningly all-consuming, and sometimes—a fact that Fox would never admit to anyone—a relief to fall into.

Lord Sidious, of course, took notice.

Small snippet to whet your appetite:

“Commander Fox,” the General said cheerily. His voice was warped by his rebreather, but even through that, Fox could hear a certain depth to it that few could replicate. He kept pace with Fox’s quick stride easily, robes swishing dramatically behind him. “Wolffe has told me about you.”

Fox sighed internally. “Yes, General. Can I help you with anything, sir?”

The General just hummed vaguely in response. A shivering itch crawled up Fox’s spine; he swallowed the feeling down before it got the chance to grow. The General said, “Just a chat, Commander, if you do not mind me accompanying you. You’re one of Wolffe’s batchmates, yes? His, ah… ori’vod.”

Fox slanted a look his way, hesitant. He wasn’t aware that Wolffe felt close enough to his General to share a little tidbit like that. Wolffe was already a tetchy bastard in their cadet days, and Fox knew it had only worsened as the war progressed. To share something as personal as that, in Mando’a, no less… well. It was surprising, to say the least.

[snaggie-t00th]

HALLO :D

i do apologize that i didn't have a snippet out like i wanted but, compromise, here's the whole damn thing. i also switched some stuff around in ch2 for continuity reasons :3

i got very very busy with prepping for an art faire (if anyone knows where to get cheap high quality prints let a mf know PLSSS) and i was muy busy. but we're back. and echo's a sweet dork.

mando'a translations!

ke'pare - wait/hold on

ge'tal - red

vor'e - thanks

udesii - chill out/its okay

gender neutral pronouns, no y/n usage, only main descriptor im sticking to about the reader is that you're ginger. cus i am. sorry nerds.

-immediately follows the events of the preceding chapter-

You were fighting back a smile. You had no idea that some of the clones knew Mando’a, let alone that the Mandolorian-adoptee turned clone-donor Jango Fett was taught during his short time on your home planet. You wondered if it was something the Kaminoans decided or if they all went about teaching themselves in Jango’s honor. The idea of a bunch of clone soldiers sitting around a Mando’a children’s dictionary makes the smile stitching onto your face that much harder to fight.

“I’m sorry about Tech. He can be, ah, a lot.” Echo grimaced while swiveling around the copilot’s seat, presenting it to you.

You obliged, and sat down. “Oh he’s fine. There’s plenty of topics I could infodump about, just as annoyingly. I just have a bad habit of my thoughts becoming verbal.” You shook your head, soft auburn tresses flicking about. The lights from the cockpit glinted around the natural highlights of your hair, and it didn’t escape Echo’s gaze.

The man cleared his throat. “Still, I appreciate you being so accommodating of my brothers. Nat-borns don’t seem to get it, you know?”

You furrowed your brow and cocked your head slightly to the left, looking him in the eyes. While he didn’t physically shudder, you could see the slight panic pulse in his iris when you met his gaze.

“Where do you think clones get their camaraderie and brotherhood from?”

Echo shrugged. “Kaminoans, I presume?”

You barked a laugh. “Well, yes. Ke’pare, what did they tell you guys about Mandalore?”

“Not much. Jango was around for the first few years, but I rarely saw him. He didn’t seem to hold much emotion for the regs. He seemed to like the higher ups, but I didn’t become an ARC Trooper until I was shipped off that wet rock.” Echo finally slumped into his chair opposing you. As he spoke, he slowly relaxed into his seat, his hinges quietly scraping together as he moved. Once again his amber eyes met yours, a new twinkle seeming to arrive.

“You know more than you let on, ge’tal.” Echo said, narrowing his gaze.

He seemed to be sizing you up. Trying to parse out his next line of questioning. Truthfully, you were better at it than him. While his observation skills have been battle-tested, the ease in which you peppered questions at him showed years of practice he was simply unable to acquire. Outside of the occasional conversation at 79’s or a senator he was required to escort, Echo’s entire social sphere only extends to his brothers. You made him nervous. In a very good way.

You blushed at the newly acquired nickname. “I prefer to call it ‘not showing my full hand’, but I’ll slide a few cards your way since you seem cute.”

The back of Echo’s neck started to bloom a soft red. He rubbed a palm on his knee, mindlessly self soothing. “Seem? What, the gray skin and hollow cheeks not working their magic?” He joked, gesturing to each feature respectively with a pointed index finger.

“You seem to deflect compliments because you can’t believe them, so I was starting small.” You extended your own index finger and poked at his shoulder, annunciating the seem.

The now-scarlet tint of Echo’s neck began to creep towards his face. Eyes darting towards the floor, he opened his mouth to speak, but closed it. He pressed his lips together for a moment. The only thing he got out was a weak “Vor’e.”

“Udesii. I came here, didn’t I?” Your face softened. Echo’s almost immediate vulnerability around you made your knees feel like jelly, and you were sending a silent prayer somewhere that you were both sitting down. “You’re not gonna scare me off, but you can’t immediately go cracking jokes just ‘cus I said you’re handsome.” You continued. Soft, yet firm. You weren’t allowing Echo to talk poorly of himself, even in jest.

Echo nodded, meeting your gaze once more. He looked off for a moment, seemingly in thought, before returning your gaze and asking softly: “How do you always know what to say?”

You let out one quick heh. “Since I found someone to give the words to.” You reply cheekily.

Echo smiled once more and dipped his head. “Walked into that one huh?”

You both smiled, and a comfortable silence began to envelope the two of you. Both of you were looking out on the horizon. The sky was a deep pink and purple haze, stippled with the indigo hues of the impending twilight. Echo was scanning the distance, as if anything alive would be out there, let alone a threat. You were content watching the 2 ½ clouds in the sky move millimeters at a time, but something told you to look at your companion. Gazing at him, your eyes slowly roved up his face. His jaw was set in a defined line, lightly gritted in concentration. His cheeks were hollow, but his cheekbones sat quite prominently, catching the light. This, juxtaposed with his deep set eyes, allowed the light to dance right at the forefront of his face. As if a candle was eye level with him, across the room.

“See anything cool?” You finally speak, hoping Echo didn’t catch you staring.

“Nah, perimeter check. I’m sure all I’ll see is bones and dirt but, old habits die hard.” He replied, not looking away. After a beat, he nodded, and seemingly relaxed the scrutinous gaze he had moments ago.

“Huh. So, what makes your squad different from the other clones, other than haircuts, tattoos, and builds?” You change the subject.

“Being experimental meant the Kaminoans could enhance certain characteristics. Wrecker’s strength, Tech’s smarts, Crosshair’s accuracy, and Hunter’s senses.” Echo spun his chair to face you and threw one leg over the other.

“Huh.” You think for a moment before replying. “So you think Hunter heard us approach?”

Echo nodded. “And I’m willing to bet he’s going to call me a serf for the next 3 rotations.”

You barked out a laugh before realizing his implication. A hand shot over your mouth and your eyes grew wide.

The man laughed. “Just be glad he’s not close enough to hear your heartbeat.”

“What CAN’T he hear?” You said, mildly exasperated. “How do you get any privacy?”

“He’s got noise canceling headphones but that’s mainly for his own sanity. Wrecker got them for him after his snoring kept him up for 3 days in a row.” You laughed at that, and Echo felt a twinge of pride before continuing. “He showed up in the cockpit one morning with his bandana over his nose and Omega had to ask him about his new fashion choices.”

You let out a series of giggles at that, holding your stomach slightly as you lean forward into it. If your eyes weren’t scrunched shut, you would’ve seen Echo’s face bloom in 4 different shades of pink. Every single part of him was committing this to memory. The way your eyes crinkled at the sides. The way your cheeks almost wanted to push your eyes out of their sockets. He never wanted this to end, the sounds of your joy echoing across the hold of the Marauder.

——————

Hours had passed, the sun well below the horizon by this hour. The sky was peppered with numerous constellations and star systems, the names of which always seeming to escape you. The deep blue sea of sky felt more vast than ever in your little perch aboard the Marauder.

You and Echo went back and forth, sharing tidbits from your respective lives up until this point. You learned about the Rishi Moon incident that gave Echo his ARC status, he learned about the Siege that gave way to your arrival here. He told you about the Domino Squad, you told him about your own clan’s untimely demise. Hours of stories shared back and forth, as if you were both once stationed on the same battlefield and then whisked away, only to be brought back together once more after all these years. But there was no mutual history to draw upon this familiarity from. The two of you just fell into a steady rhythm. One that you’d individually practiced and honed for years, like a song that was never intended for a duet, only for the two to sound identical.

“...And that’s where I learned Keldabe Handshakes are applicable as a neutralizing tactic across species.” You finished, explaining the first and only time a Shriek-Hawk has successfully taken you off guard.

“Charming.” A voice hissed, and then a pair of boots dropped to the ground with a soft thunk. “Echo, shouldn't you be putting your toys away? It’s late.” Crosshair slunked into the cockpit, seemingly from the shadows. You scoffed and rolled your eyes. “I must be a pretty expensive toy to trade for speeder brakes.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised you’ve never been with someone and lost track of time, Cross. That does tend to require social skills and, y’know, liking people?” Echo crossed his arms and stared his brother down.

“Well unless they’re taking your bunk, you should tell Tech someone’s joining him in the cockpit tonight. It’s too late to take them back now.” Crosshair seemed to spit the last part of the sentence, annoyed that someone else is in his space and bothering his brothers. While you understood hesitancy, you felt as if he reveled in his current position rather than proceeding with caution.

Echo turned to you and looked into your eyes softly. “It’s up to you.”

“I’m already cramping an already small ship. I can kick it up here with Tech for the night.” You said, smiling. While you very badly wanted to just crawl into Echo’s bunk with him, you weren’t doing that the first day. Plus, you don’t know how Echo feels about his personal space, or his sleeping positions, or if he prefers one side of the b—

“How touching.” Crosshair cut off your thoughts with the remark. He spun on his heel, and disappeared just as quickly as he appeared. Echo sneered at the doorway.

“Are you sure? I don’t mind sleeping up here. Like I said, Tech can be a lot sometimes.” Echo looked back at you, eyes full of worry.

“Tell you what, I’ll come get you if he’s being too much and we can switch, okay?” You compromise, getting the understanding that Echo’s going to worry either way.

“Deal.” Echo said firmly with a nod, and stands up. “For as much of a dick as he is, Crosshair’s right, it is rather late.” You nod and shrug slightly in agreement.

Echo turns to you and leans down. “Try and get some rest.” He gives you a quick peck on the cheek before turning on his heel and borderline speeding out of the room.

When the door shuts automatically, you ghost your hand along your cheek, and an uncontrollable smile breaks across your face.

I think he likes me.

[angelcqre]

Ti Te Ka'Ra

Mandalorian!141/Jedi!Reader / 55 BBY / Eventual GhostxReader

The first night is spent meditating, projecting calm into the force and trying to ignore how loud these men are. You can hear every step, every sharp bark of laughter, every word of murmured mando’a. You can feel their intent. There’s a grim sort of camaraderie that permeates the ship.

It feels like family - like belonging, similar but not quite the same to the temple’s home-sense. Stubborn, more possessive, but that lingering home-sense is thick and heady. You wonder how long they've been a team. From the feeling of it, years. Echoes of them remain in the force, lingering like a blown-out candle, stuck to the walls and ceiling and vents.

If the captain - Price, he tells you, narrows his eyes and puffs it around his cigarra - thinks anything about the fact just you haven’t moved from the stool in the past ten hours, he doesn’t say anything. Merely mutters something about shabu'jetii and drops a mug of tea down in front of you.

You take it appreciatively. Offer him a smile and gesture for him to sit in one of the stools beside you, the baby in your other hand. He does with a groan.

“Swear to the stars, they get more uncomfortable each time I sit.” He mutters, lips pressing thin when his gaze flits back to you and realizes what you’re doing. Admittedly, it’s a superfluous use of the force to float your mug up to your mouth, but you’ve got your hands full of exhausted youngling and tea only stays good when it’s hot. Maybe you should stop. You don’t.

“Have you had the ship for long?”

It’s a polite question - you know he’s had it for years, the pervading home-sense is indication enough of that, but you’re eager to divert his attention away from disapproval and discomfort. You’re here. You’re a Jedi. You’re going to use the force, whether he personally approves of it or not.

“Almost ten years,” He grumbles, chewing on his cigarra, setting warm eyes beyond you. “Been flying her longer than I’ve been in the current mand'alor's service.”

Your brows quirk, hum softly.

“Rare for a mandalorian to be running missions for the republic.” You say, a question but not. Give him space to decide whether he wants to answer or not. The force in the ship is strange - thick with tension, edged with copper and spice and life that feels so alien compared to the serene blanket of the temple. It feels too rich, too vibrant, almost spicy.

You drink your tea. Let the flavors soak your tongue sharp and acrid, pull you out before you sink back into the meditative state.

"Rare for the child of a senator to end up on the battlefield of a civil war," He counters, brow quirking in what feels like another accusation. "Millions of parsecs from coruscant. That not curious to you, jed’ika?"

Of course it’s curious to you. There are countless bad actors that could be attributed to the kidnapping of a force sensitive baby, countless bad actors that could be attributed to the child of a senator, but together? It’s implausible. Strange. Something out of a shab holonovel, not reality.

You don’t voice that.

“You don’t think it’s your…” You trail off, pinch your brows. Search for the word that he’s said before and fail to grasp it, the shapes of mando’a not quite familiar enough to hold.

“Kyr’tsad. Death Watch. No. S'not Kyr'tsad. Would've killed her."

Your eyes go wide at how casually he says it, at the ease of it, and instinctively, you grasp the child closer, brows pinching. You've seen your fair share of suffering - as a watchman, you go where the force feels you're needed, and you're often needed where people are suffering, but..

But the way he says it is too settled. Like he's seen worse. Like he doesn't have any faith in the enemy, like he's seen things firsthand. He probably has. You fight the urge to soothe the stress away in the force, instead wrapping yourself and the child up in a blanket of calm, weave it nice and warm and watertight against the sluice of dread that fills the air.

"Could be one've your dar'jetii," Quips a voice as the handsome one - Gaz, his name is Gaz - approaches, dropping heavily into the space beside Price, loosely clutching a cup of caf in his hand. Once again, his bucket is off, and his face is schooled into neutrality, "No reason to think it's one of ours."

"It's not."

"How d'you know?" Gaz leans forwards, eyebrow quirked, takes a sip of his caf and narrows his eyes.

"Because it's impossible."

"Nothing's impossible, love." Price this time, his gaze still glued to the baby. The anxiety that twists your stomach at his implication is displeasing, and you begin to thumb at the baby's swaddle, realizing there's embroidery across it.

"This is," You say, voice flat, unamused, thumb running over the letters, the aurebesh crisp and fresh, trying to figure it out from touch alone. Mikha, maybe - mern-isk-kreath-aurek - though that doesn't feel right. "We would know if it was the sith. We'd feel it. It's not possible."

Mikha doesn't feel accurate. Micha (mern-isk-cherek-aurek) or Mika (mern-isk-krill-aurek) or something like it. The third letter is strange, the cursive aurebesh almost too vague for you to gauge on touch alone. You ignore the anxiety that tightens your core at the idea of the sith.

You'd know. You'd know.

"You'd feel it?"

You try not to bristle at the incredulity, tell yourself it's not meant to offend, that mandalorians are intense and passionate and unschooled, that they're not held to the same culture of passivity and serenity that you are, but it's difficult when the captain looks at you with pity and condescension. Like you're some child, hopeful and pitiful and naive.

Like you're a fool.

You are definitively not a fool. There's nothing naive about the knowledge that you'd know if the sith were still around - they're all but extinct now, a child's tale to keep crechelings from misbehaving. Kark it, you're a jedi, for force's sake. Clever and encompassing and wise beyond your years.

And yet, the men before you look at you with that same doubt, and you're the first to break the staring contest, glancing down.

Mira. Mern-isk-resk-aurek. A sweet name for a sweet baby.

"I'd know," You tell her. "I would."

[kookyburrowing]

Adventures In Clonelang Part 1: How The Fuck Do They Sound

Hi. Hello. I’m finally starting on this gigantic horrible project for real. So first up is phonetics! Because in order to make a language I need to know how it sounds.

Overview

It’s pretty similar to english but with some exceptions—it includes a glottal stop and like Mando’a has no “f” or “x.”  Unlike Mando’a, it makes frequent use of “z” and related sounds.  Also, it does NOT have “Q” because “Q” is nonsense. 

Vowel Sounds

A, E, O, U - this spelling indicates short vowel sound. These are the same as in English. 

Exceptions: “I” is pronounced as a long “E,” and “O” is always long.  “E” can also sometimes be pronounced as a long “A” in Mando’a loan words.

AA, II, OO, UU - this spelling indicates a long vowel sound, except with “O” where it indicates “Ooh”.

Vowel doubles:

AU - Pronounced “ow.”

AI - Pronounced “eye.”

AY - Pronounced like the “ay” in the English word “way.”

Consonants

B, D, G, H, K, L, M, N, P, R, S, T, V, W, Y, Z: pronounced the same except for G and Y.  G is only a hard G, while Y is only used in conjunction.  

Consonant doubles: 

ZH: Soft “J” sound.

DJ: Hard “J” sound.  

CY/C: “Sh” sound.

Notes

This is a very basic draft of the sounds. I think the language should have at least some influence from te reo Māori, so I have tried to include some influences from there but my knowledge of the language is very, VERY limited so some of this will change as I learn more. If anyone has any advice on that score it would be greatly appreciated—I’d rather be told I’m wrong now than later once I’ve done a ton of work.

[ranahan]

A little something to come out of my Mando’a morphology project: baar’ur as a construction is equivalent to English physician. And that’s why it’s a general term. As a quick suggestion, you might combine it with a military rank, or alor, or another specifier to get to a more precise job title.

Just wanted to say, a doctor and a medic are not always the same thing! A doctor could be a medic, but a medic doesn’t have to be a doctor! The terms are not always interchangeable :)

(Please please never ever ask me to act as a medic LOL)

(Brought to you after noting Mandalorians in fic being referred to as baar’ur [medic] even though they are in fact explicitly a doctor.)

[djarins-cyare]

Chapter 33 ‘The Exhibition’

A chapter of extremes…

🍀 Soft Din Djarin will give you anything you want on your birthday…

… and then the sexy times begin.

To everyone who has been supportive of this story: I love you, you’re beautiful, and I can’t tell you how much it means to me. Thank you isn’t good enough.

Let’s try Mando’a: vor entye (I accept a debt) 💚