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silksaddle · 2 years

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Forage

Part One: Gathering

Pairing: Din Djarin x F!Reader

Summary: A scavenger working under Nevarro's trading post, your discoveries are scarce until a Mandalorian finds you in a somewhat compromising position. Post season 2.

Series Rating: E (for eventual smut wink wink)

Chapter Warnings: language, weapons, Din is way too attractive so he gets his own warning, space alcohol (?), gentle mutual roasting (for fun)

Words: 3.5k

Notes: gif by @djarsdin; thank you! And another thank you to @highsviolets, @danidrabbles, and @moodsworks who read over parts of this for me, it means the world! I hope you all enjoy this new series.

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You’ve never seen anything like it. The ship sitting down the black rocky hill looks like it’s been here for months, dull and covered in dust, the open ramp climbing into a hull full of expensive weaponry.

Stars above— this’ll get you through the next month.

Excitement trails up your spine as you carefully guide yourself down the jagged edges of the rocks, dust and pebbles skittering out from under your feet. Have you just missed it before? You don’t often take the same routes on your scavenging, and this is well out of the way of civilization and any repair stops.

The rock threatens to snag your hood, your legs nearly wobbling over as you meet the end of the small cliff. The silver wings of the ship span vastly above you, but sheets of durasteel seem as if they’re about to fall off.

It looks vacant, hardly clean enough to have moved through space lately. Speed would have knocked all the grime off of it, right? And who would just leave their ramp down like this? To you, this is free range.

You lug your knapsack of trinkets up to the entrance of the giant ship, looming over the cracks and fissures of Nevarro. The fabric looped around your shoulders is already filled with a chain necklace picked off the ground, the handle of a blaster along with other random tool parts, and also on your back, your best find in the past month. It must be a rifle, of some sort. Its fork shaped resonator fits into a long barrel, the stock of it brown and made of wood. You’ve tried your best not to touch it; if one thing sets off on it, you’re ninety-nine percent sure it’s going to kill you.

You perform a perimeter check of the ship, its silver swimming in the dark pink sunset, ensuring no one nearby emerges as your eyes catch onto the ships of the mercenaries returning to the trading post. Krall will probably want to see you back there soon, but you’re not too keen on returning now; tomorrow, you’ll bring your finds in. As the head collector, he favours those mercenaries most, assigning them quests to locate skulls of rare species, lost chalices— and you’re stuck here with the scraps. Your discoveries are still useful to the Togruta, and eagerly paid for, but there’s a suffocating feeling that follows you, working solely from one planet.

The post just gets a little crowded, is all.

You glance back at the run-down ship. Maybe this one will be your big break.

Walking up the ramp with a giddy rush in your stomach, you place the rifle gently on the floor of the ship before you get to work, fingers trailing along the walls, bumping over the ridges and exposed wire.

Some sort of compartment sits toward the back, and you feel out the metal until your fingers spot a button. Pressing it, a shiny door slides up and reveals a bunk.

A tiny bunk.

The rumpled sheets are pushed back, but they’re cold to the touch. Is this really an abandoned ship? You whip your head around at a loud humming noise, relief spreading from your lungs when you register it had only been the gentle wind caressing over the weakened durasteel.

Well. You’ll keep looking.

The next thing you find comforts you no more than the chilled bunk sheets. You open the closet-like doors by the cot to an armory, with… more blasters than you can count, with the way your head swims. Whoever owned this ship was a killer, no doubt.

You take a blaster from its mount on the wall, admiring its sparkling glint, as if it’s just been polished and greased. It tempts you to pack it away, to replace the malfunctional blaster strapped to your thigh with this hefty, new, sleek one. Reluctantly, you mount it back on the door, and start to rummage somewhere else. The sheets of metal on the exterior seem like your best bet— not dangerous or deadly unless you tried hard enough, but useful, and a good resource to leave at the trading post.

Slowly, you do a final scan of the hull, and find yourself too scared to climb up the ladder to what must be the cockpit. All the storage seems to be down here, anyway.

Something isn’t right— it’s too dark, the blasters are too numerous, the ship keeps whining at you— it’s not abandoned. It would have been salvaged already. It must be—

The pulse in your neck pounds uncomfortably hard as you snatch the rifle off the floor, your boots scraping against the worn durasteel, and disoriented, you stumble down the ramp into another wall.

Except, you stop yourself short, and it’s not a wall in the slightest.

It’s a Mandalorian. Covered head to toe in beskar, a spear poking up from his shoulder as his body shields you from escape. He's a giant. Hands at his sides, fingers relaxed, shoulders broad and steady.

“Find what you want?”

His voice is deceptively soft as it is raspy, with a smug edge, and you can’t fight the sharp gasp that leaps from your throat, or your hand aimlessly flying out in front of you in a poor attempt at self-protection.

“Holy sh—”

His head tilts and you panic, unsure whether to slip your blaster from its slot on your thigh, to try and duck out of his way and run, or to brace yourself for whatever your fate is for getting caught in a compromising position by a Mandalorian.

“I’m— I’m sorry— is this your ship? I was just leaving, I thought it was—”

“I know.” His gaze drops down your body, his words firm.

“I promise I didn’t take anything,” you ease away from him and up the ramp, your hood blowing against your hair, voice shaking. “I didn’t know—”

You swallow dryly, a snap of guilt hitting you in the back, as if you’ve committed a heinous crime. Had you? You’re not even sure anymore, but you feel as if you’re going to get your ass handed to you.

“I know. I’m not here to hurt you,” he says, holding up his hands in a placating manner, his boots remaining put where he stands. He lets you look at his empty palms in an uncertain gesture of comfort, a reassurance that it’s okay; you’re okay. “I… watched you.”

Involuntarily, your startled fear makes you take another step and slip backwards and down onto your hands. He huffs, easing his weight into one hip.

“Watched me?” you gawk, your wrists aching from the drop onto the hard surface. Embarrassment pricks your shoulders, your breath escaping with a deep sigh— what luck. What timing.

He dwarfs you, your neck craning up, and up, and up to accommodate his height. He’s… the strongest looking man you’ve ever seen, and it’s not just the armor that makes him so. You’re expecting him to pounce any second, waiting to be cuffed, yelled at, or plainly told off.

His hand is barely extended out to help you when you pick yourself up instead with a warmer face than before, and dust yourself off, the rifle still in your hand.

Smoke curls up from the rocks in the distance behind him, but where the hell had he been watching you from? You did a fairly detailed check before you went in— it doesn’t matter now.

“Aren’t you gonna…” you gesture awkwardly, motioning towards his blaster, then letting your hand fall back to your side as you leave the suggestion open.

“I’m not,” he takes a step back to allow you more space to calm yourself as your brows knit together, but his tone turns harder than it was before. “I was told I’d find you out here, just not on my ship.”

Guilt hangs over you at the way he scolds the words my ship, as if you should have been able to tell this junk heap was still kicking at first glance. And what business does a Mandalorian want with you? Flicking your gaze back up to the black visor in front of you, you narrow your eyes in confusion. “What?”

The beskar reflects the warm sunset, magenta glowing on chrome. He appears to glance behind you to scan the hull, and once satisfied that you really hadn’t taken anything, he turns his attention back, nearing you.

“The collector said you have something I want. And you do.”

His voice dips low on the last dregs of his sentence, and he gestures with a finger in the direction of your shoulder, where the wooden, curved end of the rifle looms. Your breath catches, but relief momentarily overrides your previous guilt, seeping through every bone in your body at the mention of Krall, to know you’re not just some random person the Mandalorian can do away with. “Help me and I’ll let you off.”

“Wha— you want this thing?” You lift it higher in your grip, heart hammering away in your chest. With your forearm, you wipe a swathe of dirt from your temple to assuage the sudden sensation of vulnerability, and you internally start to scold Krall for giving this Mandalorian info about you, for telling him of your great find of the month.

“I have a store of objects off some bounties that I can trade you for it.”

This time, he approaches the deal with a gentler energy, but you’re still too frazzled to let your guard down.

Trade?

The revelation that he’s a bounty hunter makes it no easier for you. Taking a deep breath, you extend the weapon to him, as if accepting your fate that he could end you with it right here.

“You can just take it,” you mumble, inching to the side, surrendering the majority of your credits for the week. “I’m sorry I went looking through your ship, I know it looks bad.”

“Hey, no—”

He barks after you, whipping an arm out in your path.

“Please take it, I didn’t want to cause you any trouble. I just thought your ship was…” you subtly keep on edging down the ramp, but he pauses, his fist closing above yours on the rifle’s handle.

“... Garbage.”

You fight off a smirk at his mildly offended tone, but a quiet snort comes out instead, a hand clapping over your mouth. He peers out to the horizon melting into its nightly purple hue, ignoring your dig with another sigh, assessing the port.

“I can’t let you go empty handed,” he continues almost annoyedly, looking back to you, “so how are we gonna do this?”

Perplexed, your brows knit together. “Why do you want to trade?”

You’re offering it to him just for an escape ticket— it’s better than giving up whatever junk he took from his bounties. “Why give me something in return?”

“Because you didn’t steal from me. You were harmless.”

He says it so simply. You immediately make a frown, fixing your posture to give yourself an extra inch, and in the back of your mind, you’re faintly aware of just how little it’s doing for your dominance. “Harmless?”

Your feelings fly in every direction all at once. Annoyed, nervous, heartbreakingly happy that he’s not going to hurt you. Harmless. He can tell that to your blaster. Not that you could necessarily make a mark with him, unless you shot him in the cuirass.

He remains quiet, letting a hand sit on his belt, his thumb tucking on the interior side against his abdomen. “You got pretty… frightened.”

“You scared me,” you grumble at him, shoulders slouching.

Mando shifts, comfortably in control, and a breath of his scent— heady leather and musk— graces your nose as he steps closer, looking straight into your eyes. “You gonna help me out or not?”

***

When it comes to scavenging, the Mandalorian has it a lot easier than you. His bounties do the basic work for him; he takes the quarry, pulls their belongings, and he comes to the post after collecting new bounty pucks to get extra credits for the old possessions. You’ve scavenged the entire surface area of Nevarro, and you’re willing to bet on that. But you don’t actually mind it— he does seem to have some interesting objects.

His suggestion to move into the cantina after a sour trek from the ship sees you sitting across from him with a cup of Nikta as he lays out the bag of objects he brought along, and they cascade over the table in a circular shape. Bits of silver shine at you in the dark alcove, your eyes then picking up a glint of something red— a jewel, of some kind. But that’s not what has your attention.

The cantina’s noise drowns out as you narrow your eyes— it’s full, and warm, but not in a cozy way. It’s stuffy in the grey-scale room, and the one thing that pulls you from recognizing the sticky surfaces are the dull pieces of an undetermined material scattered throughout the pile.

The Mandalorian slowly bends down to sit, his thighs spreading as his arm slings over the back of the seat. His other arm comes to rest on the surface of the table, but he drinks nothing, orders nothing for himself. His body fills out the booth, broad chest glinting at you, and you stare for a moment without a thought as he settles in.

Unlike him, you sit in a reserved way, hands on your lap and your feet touching each other on the floor.

You’re not sure if you’re scared of him. You know everyone else is— he’s huge, covered in indestructible material, his creed made up of the best warriors in the galaxy. The second you walked in, everyone stared and whispered, like they felt threatened just by his presence.

But from what you can tell, he’s nice if you’re nice. Surprisingly so, for being caught rummaging through his ship— at least you’d had an item to bargain with.

Something dull catches your eye again. When you bring your fingers to smooth over it, pushing the other trinkets away, you register its material as clay, a shard of a ceramic pot. Its rough surface is adorned with a pattern, withered away with time, blue lines winding around an orange base.

“Hold on—” you pause, raising the jagged piece toward the nearest source of light. He cocks his head, says nothing, so you continue in the silence. “Where did you get this?”

“The bounty was on Coruscant.”

“And what were they wanted for?”

“Thievery.”

Your throat catches on air, your eyes rapidly darting back to the ceramic shard. “Stars.”

Mando perks up at your reaction, straightening his back as he lowers his voice, inaudible to anyone else but you.

“What is it?”

A tingle touches your spine and you stutter, scanning the rest of this bag’s contents, locating another piece that fits neatly next to the first one.

“These… These must be pieces of the antique Twi’lek pots,” you breathe, but that doesn’t seem to mean anything to Mando. “This could be worth a lot of credits.”

He runs his gloved thumb over his pointer, considering your words, then he bars his forearm over the table, not looking at the objects in your hands.

“Yeah?”

“Yes,” you reply, perspiration covering your palms as you slip into an excited account of the artifact, “it was said these were lost. They were kept in the archives on Coruscant when the Empire rose, and apparently were heavily damaged during an attempted theft… your bounty must have found the pieces.”

You wouldn’t trust it, but he almost seems like he’s entertained by your rambling, leaning in closer the longer you talk, nodding along to your anecdotes. That ship seemed… dark. Lonely.

“Huh.”

“Krall would hound you for these.” You push them back in his direction, “You can get one hell of a bargain for them. Even if they’re broken.”

Mando makes a soft grunt of consideration beneath his helmet, and guides the pieces to you again with one large hand. “I only want the rifle. You take them.”

Your jaw hangs slightly for a prolonged moment, and the room fills with more patrons as you shut your mouth with a sigh. No one dares to bother you— as horrifying as your meeting had been, he’s making a visit to the cantina loads easier.

“You’d be losing a lot of credits…”

“I keep a lower profile by trading with you. Do you want them?” Mando reclines, nodding toward the table covered in precious pieces.

“I— I couldn’t—” you smile, and you mean it just as much as you want it. You can’t take something that valuable just for a chance discovery of a rare weapon; you didn’t find the pots, you can’t take the reward.

Biting your lip, you glance aside at the bar’s counter, where there’s a Rodian guzzling down spice cider in front of the server droid, painfully aware of the Mandalorian’s gaze. You can’t see it, but you feel it, you know it’s there, and you think you like it.

“Why do you need it so bad?” You ask him instead, and he doesn’t move an inch when he tells you.

“I lost mine. They’re not carried by many weapon stores,” Mando replies. “Where did you find it?”

You take a sip of your Nikta, brows furrowing together at the sharp taste. “Just… in this crash the other day. No one was there, but this was, as well as all these ship parts, intact. It was just lucky.”

“So you technically didn’t steal it.”

“Scavs don’t steal anything,” you retort pointedly, “we only take lost and discarded items and sell them for credits or use them to fix things. At least I recognized the ship was still in use without your help.”

He grunts, “Thanks for the compliment.”

Raising your brow, you want to laugh at him again, but you stuff it back and blink instead, amused that he has yet to let go of the notion that his ship looked a little less than decent.

You inhale deeply and peer through his visor, only to be met with more black. You hope you’re looking into his eyes— but you suppose he prefers not to be seen anyway. Everyone had looked at him in malice, for the price of his armour, but not you.

A streak of lamp light shines on him through an opening in the wall to the outdoors, skating across the shape of his pauldron with each breath he takes.

And then it hits you out of nowhere, when your eyes fall down to the triangle shape over his gloves, the orange tips of the leather.

“Were... you the Mandalorian that shot up the Guild?”

And what happened to that little child, the green thing with the bug eyes and the giant ears? It’s only talk, so far as you’re concerned, and you’re half-regretting your decision to ask already.

“That’s old news.”

Alright. Yes he was.

The Guild had been reinstated a while back along with a restoration of the main row, during a time when your scavenging finds were in the higher numbers, and so were your credits.

“They let you back into work?”

Mando huffs a low sound, running a palm down the beskar adorning his thigh. “I made some amends.”

There’s the end of that. You sense your time for pressing questions is up.

You swallow the rest of the Nikta, and still, he doesn’t say much to fill your silence until you circle back to the real purpose of you being here; sitting in a booth with a strange Mandalorian.

“I’m telling you, Mando, you would rather trade this stuff for credits. I can’t take it from you.”

“I thought scavs wanted this stuff,” he says evenly, his sentiment almost more of a question rather than a thought.

Fuck, you don’t want to lose this opportunity— you shut down your skepticism with a pinch of your thigh.

“Okay. Fine.” You relent, dropping your head down and peeking at him through your lashes. Your chest sinks on the inside, as if you’ve ripped him off— it’s not your problem. He was damn insistent.

“Thank you.” He speaks his gratitude sincerely, and you feel your face rapidly heating up at the raspy way it sounds. You hand the hefty weapon over to him as he rises and crosses to your side to take it into his hands, inspecting its handle, the scope, the barrel. His fingers are gentle along the material, caressing the length of it with focus. “This’ll do well.”

You crane your neck up again as you watch him sling it over his body, adjusting the strap with a few deft tweaks. It belongs on him, matches his powerful exterior.

“What does that thing do, anyway?”

“Just hope you won’t have to see it,” is all he responds with, before quietly offering to lug the bag over to the trading post for you. “And be careful next time you wanna climb into an unfamiliar ship. You’re lucky I was looking for you.”

***

When the Mandalorian returns to Nevarro a month later, he seeks you in the market, carrying another satchel of items pick-pocketed off bounties on his shoulder, ready to trade for your scavenged goods.

#din djarin #the mandalorian #the mandalorian x reader #din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #the mandalorian x you #star wars #the mandalorian fanfic #pedro pascal #pedrostories #does anyone else's writing style change significantly upon writing in the sw universe #useran #tusercora #usermarshal

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silksaddle · 2 years

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Forage

Part Two: The Foxhole

Pairing: Din Djarin x F!Reader

Series rating: E

Summary: Continuing your trades with the Mandalorian, your next discovery is more valuable than you thought, placing you in danger.

Chapter warnings: canon typical violence, weapons, injury + blood, language, Din Djarin (again), hurt/comfort I guess??

Words: 5.6k

Notes: gif by @bladesrunner! Thank you! And welcome to chapter 2. I hope you all enjoy; after season 2, I’ve been wanting to explore how Din’s gentler side may show itself after losing Grogu. EDIT: this chapter has been revised with minor changes, but nothing affects the plot!

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Laying on your back underneath your new speeder, you give yourself ten more seconds of tinkering before sliding out in a sweat and curling your spine over your knees.

What a waste of credits.

Krall interrogated you with an amazed look on his face as he appraised the shards of the pots, his orange fingers tracing over the design twenty-two times before sliding you four hundred credits across the counter. He proudly placed the pieces on display in the post by the artifacts piled on artifacts, and the few sad looking parts in between, hung and shelved under warm light.

Four hundred, four double-o— none of which you felt you really earned. The pieces soon returned to the Coruscant archives by a generous payment of eight hundred credits to Krall, but at the least it helped to ease you, knowing they were back in a safe, rightful place. It didn’t matter he got paid double what he gave you.

The reward gave you enough funds to land a speeder, not fancy, or new, or even necessarily functional, but still a better option than walking every which way and carrying all your parts on your back— which all would have been fine if the damn thing wanted to work.

You glance aside, shielding your eyes from the morning sun, watching the smoky lava river in the distance from the exterior of your small hut. A pile of scrapped parts lay in your net, all set to be delivered to the post— hopefully— by evening.

Mando’s been back a handful of times since the incident on his ship, sparing you with an extra form of motivation to keep on looking for valuables— ones you hope he’ll take in exchange. The second time he’d snuck up on you in the market, ("No, I am not tracking you," he grumbled to your horror), and the third, you’d been bent over, your torso lodged inside a long forgotten TIE fighter, unfortunately already salvaged by the Jawas.

Although your healthy fear of the faceless man still gradually disappears, you did feel inclined to trust that he wasn't following you on purpose.

He hardly speaks above a rasp, and utters no words beyond what he deems vital to communication. But he’s not short with you, either. His manners surprise you after you’re over the initial shock of his arrival, and his hands stay where you can see them. His tone doesn’t go harsh; he just manages to scare the shit out of you with his quiet approaches.

And underneath it all, you don’t know what compels him to keep coming to you, rather than going to earn solid credits from Krall for the stuff he brings— technically steals. He’d said it helps him keep a lower profile to trade with you, and perhaps that’s true, but you— you’d been on his ship, looked through his space, and yet he prefers your help to any other’s.

There was, of course, the time he found your modest home. You’d been crouched inside your hut on the rug, legs crossed, furiously polishing at durasteel parts due for the post when he appeared with a satchel in hand.

“Here to see the hellhound from my ship,” he greeted lowly, some of his armour bearing black marks and looking rather charred.

When you questioned him, he nonchalantly claimed to have determined it was your home by spotting the “trashed speeder” outside, to which he earned a gentle tongue lashing from you. But within moments, you invited him in without any second thought, a little crazed, and his size forced him to duck his head to fit through the drape and into the cozy, mix-matched room. He’d hesitated, just barely.

Piles of random items surrounded the single, cramped area inside, albeit homely. Jewel-tone blankets thrown over old cushions, a place to prepare your portions, and a lamp overhead.

He sat upon a cushion with one leg out in front of him, the other drawn up, looking much too large to even be inside the tent-like abode, and he assumed that steadfast respectfulness once settled in your space. His focus shifted to the pending trade.

He declined any offer of food or drink, and when you rose to see him out that day, he had stood to face you for a stretched moment in time by the makeshift doorway, before dropping his head in a nod.

The man had always said more to you with his body than his voice, and in that silence there, you watched him walk back into town with a squeezing heart. Eyes following him until he disappeared, melted away into the orange shades of the molten lava and half-visible sun. Other than Krall, the Mandalorian was, and is, the person you talk to most.

Pinpointed, it was this moment that you could now say you became more so friends than acquaintances. Mando came into your home, for one, but beneath that, you’d both agreed to it.

You get up to dig the toe of your boot into the ground, staring with annoyance at the speeder, refusing to start up. You’d really rather not go on foot to the post today, and you’d much prefer not to have to carry the giant net of parts this time. With a frustrated sigh, you kick at the engine and it whirs to life, roaring and popping until it settles down to a quiet rumble.

Now?

Your patience is just about non-existent with this bike, this job, this planet— how many more times do people have to lose things until you can make a better living than a tiny cot and a place to cook your portions?

You tie the net to the back of the speeder, wondering when the Mandalorian will return. Before he does, you need to find something he’ll want.

***

The next morning, fifty additional credits jingle in your pocket as you cruise through the market on foot. Grease paints your cheeks from the extra work on your speeder, haphazardly wiped away with your sleeve. Still smudged.

You slink by merchants under the overhanging fabric shades— those cooking meat in massive pots, those spinning material into thread, and those trying to lure anyone in who will check out their wares.

You’re not decided yet on where you want to go scavenging— there’s the wastes on the east side of town, or further back, the vacant landscape where, if you’re lucky, a new crash might be cooling down. With a few more steps, dodging out of a Trandoshan’s way, you come upon an alley you’re certain you’ve yet to explore. Your fingertips find a light dirt on the walls as you brush along your path, and you wheel around several more corners until you find a slender opening in one of the sidings.

You’re well concealed from the rest of the noisy market row. When you peek through, you find a staircase fashioned of more stone, leading in a downward spiral into pitch blackness.

Glancing behind you with a gasp, you ensure no one follows behind before you slowly start to step your way down, flicking on the light-stick hanging on the belt of your holster. Your grip tightens around the strap of your bag as the last dregs of daylight wither away, your lip caught in your teeth.

It smells… oddly clean. Livable. At least for the sewers, which is where you must be headed.

Arriving at the foot of the stairs, a three-way tunnel passage intersects underground, each direction stretching for miles in the dark. The noise from above drowns away; here, it’s silent and reserved.

No drips, no scuffs, no voices.

Only the echoes of your own feet, and the blood rushing in your ears.

You calm yourself with a deep breath, warily stepping through the passage ahead of you. Anybody could be down here.

The tunnel curves overhead like the alcoves in the cantina, the colour a little more beige than grey, a few empty torch slots spread out along the length of it. You stop short at the vision of a mask hanging over an arch to another area. Is it even a mask? You don’t know what it is— some sort of creature. It has silver tusks poking out, and fierce eyes carved out of it, staring you down as your hand rises to your lips, the hairs on the back of your neck standing up.

Looking ahead, an ambiguous shape appears in front of a circular smelting chamber, its fire outlets rusted with inactivity. You lower the light and shine it on the pile of items in front, and when you come up closer, you drop to your knees to run your hands over it.

It’s a clump of old armor. A helmet, some mismatched pauldrons, some chest plates.

You slowly run the backs of your fingers along the lines and divots of the helmet, a realization striking you hard in the chest. People hid down here. People were lost, taken away.

The armour is not yours to take. But you know who should take it— someone who deserves to.

Dust collects beneath your fingertips as you pick up the green chest plate next, splaying a hand over the side that used to cover a heart. This has been here a long time, and you must be the first person to set foot down here for a while, too. And even as someone who needs the credits that this beskar could be worth, the first thought that strikes you isn’t its value. What comes to you are questions— did the Mandalorian know who these belonged to? Had he a family?

Krall knows just as well as you the stories of the Mandalorians. You can’t give this away for money. It all belongs with another of their kind, not for sale or to go on display in some old trading post.

*** Back in the main market strip, you struggle through the crowd, on a mission to get yourself home and polish the armour before you eventually hand it off to Mando. You felt something, holding it in your hands. There’s a story behind this beskar now sitting on your back.

Your thighs burn from the stairs and the added weight in your bag, your breathing suddenly not so steady as you weave your way through the dozens of people, all until—

“Pardon me.”

You whirl around at the gravelly voice, nearly bumping your nose into the Mandalorian, his rifle balancing over the backs of his shoulders with two heavy bags tied to either end.

“Fuck, Mando!” You clutch your chest, digging your nails into the fabric of your jacket. He looks down at you, and you can tell the tilt of his helmet is from amusement at your jump. Shifting, he assumes his stance of one hip cocked to the side.

You breathe in, rolling your eyes for a split second, before crossing your arms and making yourself no more menacing to him. “When the hell are you gonna stop scaring me?”

“Don’t know,” he says, something funny laced in his tone, as the other market-goers begin to detour around you. “Nice to see you too.”

A pang of excitement replaces your annoyance as you notice the amount of stuff he’s carrying, the beat in your chest picking up its rhythm. What has he got for you this time? The bags hanging from his rifle fill to the brim, and the fabric strains against the contents, but he doesn’t look tired by the weight on his shoulders, if at all. A breeze whips his cape behind him, and your muscles relax back to normal as you find a better posture.

“You’ve been busy,” you remark, nodding at his belongings. Someone’s shoulder hits you as they pass, shoving you almost chest to chest with the Mandalorian, his chest spanning wide and broad by your face. Your breath hitches— you scowl at their back, but their figure immediately cuts off from your view behind Mando’s pauldron.

“Yeah.” He holds himself still, not deterred by your proximity, orange leather fingertips tightening around the rifle. “Got some stuff for you to look at.”

“I can see that.” Familiarity spreads through you like sugar stirred into hot water. “Bet my finds were better than yours, though.”

You can hear him let out a breath behind the helmet. “Think so?”

With a half-assed, muted glare, you look into his visor, forcing away your smile. “Know so.”

***

Saddled up in the habitual cantina booth you fill with him during your trades, you urge the Mandalorian to go first, the carefully arranged beskar still hiding inside your bag. You’re buzzing with anticipation just to show it to him; even though you’d never take such items into the post, you’re proud of this discovery, and hoping that he’ll like it.

Mando slowly eases the weight from his shoulders, dropping the two bags onto the table, before he sits down across from you, one hand on his knee, a forearm braced on the surface. The pulse rifle leans upright against the wall by him when he sets it down— you watch him closely as he moves, paying special attention to the bandolier strap across his body, intersecting with his belt.

“Go ahead.”

This time, you don’t feel as many nerves barring you from showing your enthusiasm— the Mandalorian, other than your first meeting, hasn’t given any reason for you to feel scared beyond that initial incident.

The cantina doesn’t get as many visitors this time of day, but there’s still music playing, a mellow, soft tune floating around the dark walls, and a handful of patrons conversing quietly. Daylight filters in by the large open space behind the bar counter, just barely reaching your booth.

Mando drums his fingertips.

Tearing into the first bag, you find a small blaster, some power packs, and a pair of binocs held in the worn fabric.

“Whoa,” you smile, “I’ve been looking all over for these!”

Turning the binocs in your hold, you inspect the features. The grey exterior plating protects the technology inside, and a strap hooks to the ends for wearing around your neck.

“Yeah?” Mando leans in, holding his gaze to you. “I didn’t look that close at it.”

The large lenses stare back at you before you hold them up to your eyes, and you’re met with an overly zoomed in view of Mando’s helmet before you turn your gaze the other way, peering outside the large rectangular window to the brightened buildings of the street. You turn again and chuckle to yourself when you zoom in on the head of a purple creature sipping through a straw, then setting the binocs down in your lap.

You offer a small smile as you work your way through the rest of the first bag and the second, your booth full of heaps of things only useful to someone with your job. Each item makes you wonder— who owned this before? You know they all belonged to criminals, barring you from feeling too much guilt that Mando now gives them off to you.

“Thank you,” you murmur thoughtfully, thumb digging into your leg. “Y’know, I don’t know why you keep coming back here. To trade with me.”

You avert your eyes from his helmet by staring down at your thighs, but you can tell he doesn’t move when you finish speaking. He takes a moment to reply, calculating, and you nod slowly out of habit when you hear his voice again.

“Your finds are more useful to me than the credits I can get at the post. You have no other connections through me— it helps me lay low.”

Lay low. What’s this obsession with staying underground? Unseen? Maybe you’ll always be none the wiser about this man’s motivations.

“Alright, well…” you dismiss his odd answer, making room for your turn. “I still think my end of the trade is better.”

“Show me,” he nods, a cocky edge tainting his voice, and you pull your bag from the space beside you with a forceful huff of effort.

“I only found these this morning…”

When the Mandalorian gently pulls the fabric open, he startles hard, his head snapping up to look at you. You shiver in your seat— is this… wrong? Was it rude to bring this to him?

He breathes heavily for some moments while your nerves build back up to one hundred, but when he speaks, his voice is soft. So quiet.

“Where did you… where did you get this?”

You blink. He sounds… choked up, like seeing it is a reminder of long-forgotten pain he never expected would resurface.

“Here. I found it underground,” you say, a mild confusion wrapping around your initial eagerness. He gathers it all and picks up the helmet, running his gloved fingertips over the shape of the visor, the two shades of blue painted in sections. You watch him warily as he hunches over it, his shoulders rising and falling, rising and falling.

“You kept all this.” He speaks with a distant energy, his helmet angling back up from its spot perched against his chest. “You didn’t sell it.”

“I wasn’t going to. It wasn’t my business, I know beskar is…” you trail off. A deep sorrow settles in your bones at the way he freezes, but you’re not sure why, or where it’s come from.

“Sacred,” he husks, large hands spreading out over a pauldron as he filters through the rest of the pieces. “You… found the covert.”

Your brow furrows— you’re not sure what he means, but you don’t have much of an inclination to ask right now.

Mando peers at you, his chestplate giving away his laboured breaths as you falter under his stare. The little golden light overhead swims over a small area of his armour with each motion. “This… is very valuable to me.”

There’s a new weight to his voice that makes your heart slow down, and everything else around you. He’s never gone so… tranquil. He handles the rest of the beskar with care, studying it, holding it near.

“There was nothing else around these?” He gestures to the stack of armour, and slides his weight forward, hopeful, expectant.

“That’s all there was,” you shake your head, and notice his fingers briefly curl into a tight fist. They unfurl after a moment, and he seems to be at a total loss. You stay silent for him as his head turns to the side, his crackling sigh filling your ears above the cantina’s noise, and you almost want to reach your hand out and console him for something you don’t even understand.

“What you did was very kind,” he starts, and his low voice warms you from the inside out. “I… didn’t know this was still here.”

And maybe that’s why he comes back, looking out for you after he collects his new bounty pucks, or his tracking fobs. You’re not selfish. You were willing to give up that rifle for nothing, and you were never going to sell the precious beskar for your own benefit.

“You knew… Did you know who these belonged to?” You ask softly, your hands clasping in your lap.

“Yes,” is all he answers with, inhaling sharply in dismissal. Nothing more to say, nothing more to open up about. But you suppose it’s not your business anyway.

“Thank you.” The Mandalorian bows his head slightly, “I’m afraid the binocs won’t cut it for what you brought me.”

“Wha— no, no. I’ll take what you have. I don’t think anything would cut it for the beskar,” you smile encouragingly, hoping he’s not wearing a sad expression. He sounds forlorn, but still reserved all the same.

“I appreciate—” he looks toward the outdoors, and one hand motions for you to duck, the other rapidly lowering to his blaster, “get down!”

A blast of red flashes across your vision through the window, then a jarring metal ping blares in your ears as your hands fly up to cover them. The fire rebounds and hits the wall where your shoulder had just been, and a hoarse yelp leaps from your throat before you can think of anything else to do. The Mandalorian already stands with his back in your way when you open your eyes again, blaster drawn, chest heaving. A sheer swirling smoke rises from where the shot hit him on the pauldron.

The frenzy erupts.

Each patron scrambles to the exit in an uncoordinated flurry. The shots keep coming through the opening, hitting jars, hitting glasses, the alcoholic drinks exploding and dripping onto the floor.

As you peer through a crack, a team of Weequay pirates emerges outside in the smoke, carrying weapons and empty nets, and a gruff voice from the exterior catches your attention: “Get the beskar.”

You duck yourself further down in the booth as Mando yells at you to stay there, preoccupied with keeping the both of you alive— his confidence spears the glumness he’d just felt through the neck. He’s shooting back.

Protected by the shield of his body, your trembling hands gather up the beskar as quickly as you can, sparks drizzling down over you from the blaster fire like a gentle rain. Only, the shots are anything but gentle.

They’re loud enough to make tears well in your eyes as you desperately bag the armour and the Mandalorian urges you to go faster— “Come on,” he says, and you’re trying, you’re doing your best, you—

A large hand clamps around your upper arm and tugs you from the booth. He crouches in front of you, fingers brushing up against your shoulder as he inspects you for a split-second, his helmet nearly crashing into your forehead when he abruptly dodges another plasma bolt.

He huffs a strangled groan, “You got the beskar?”

You nod stiffly and quick, your brows knitted harshly together. Ashen stone crumbles in small quantities around you.

“I’ll cover you.” He shoves you forward to the exit after giving your arm a harder squeeze, your hands way too occupied for you to get your own blaster out and protect yourself.

“What?!” you yell your disagreement at him despite your moving feet as you start to panic, crouching out of the line of fire with the heavy beskar in your grip. Poor shots pierce into the grey, curved walls, the Mandalorian side-stepping along your movements as you approach the exit. His boots hit the floor just by your face as you sling the bag around your back, and when you look up, everyone else has deserted the area, and four of the ten pirates lay injured already.

“Mando—"

“Run,” he barks at you, “go to the right, I got you!”

Maybe it’s not a smart choice. Maybe it’s not really a choice at all. Just instinct.

When you do as he says, you do it with closed eyes.

You run out of the cantina into the smoke and dust with a forearm barring across your face, your legs resisting the speed you’re making them go. Something grazes you as you hurry away, not sure where you’re going, but when you open your eyes, still glassy with tears, you see the trading post ransacked, artifacts broken or stolen or lit on their own small fire in broad daylight.

You scream again, and you can’t hear it. And you can’t stop yourself from pausing as you look at it— once golden and shiny this morning, now ashen and empty, Krall nowhere to be seen. Everything around it and down the road looks just the same; each merchant tent, shop, and establishment abandoned, but the racket hasn’t stopped.

The pirates approaching you with their spears and blasters raised carry some of the artifacts you found, all covered in different colours of blood.

“Get behind me!”

Mando’s roaring command pulls you away from your horrified trance, and you let another sob escape your throat before you lug the bag over to him.

“They want the armour,” he grunts, another shot of his hitting a green Weequay square in the chest as they hunt you. Keeping his elbows up, he takes the hits to ensure you’re protected, and the ammo on his boots clanks at every heavy step he takes backward, warding off imbalance.

“I fucking gathered!” you shout back, matching his speed. Smoke fills your nostrils— a cough, another tear— and then you duck again behind his large body.

“My ship is at the end of the row," he turns his head to the side as he informs you, gearing up the pulse rifle with swift, clean movements. “Just get to the end, you can do it. They’re gonna keep coming.”

Your vision blurs— the buildings you know so well merely blend together into white and grey and blue as you force your body to the end of the street. The beskar clatters on your back, and the Mandalorian hoists the rifle up, the wooden end fitting against his shoulder.

“Keep- ngh, keep going—”

A crackling buzz behind you curdles the fear in your stomach, and you whip your head around to see Mando grunting, hunched over a body, blue lightning-like electricity sizzling around their limbs before it dies down. He lifts the rifle up, and motions you to carry on. He does it so easily and viciously, his cape swishing around behind him as the remaining pirates— an entirely separate group— approach him. You knew he was a fighter, but—

“Holy shit—”

He handles them like flies. Almost effortless.

Lungs burning up inside, you spot the open hull of the ship and will yourself to last until you’re safe inside.

Safe, out of harm’s way, not a target to be killed for beskar. But when your foot touches the durasteel ramp on top of the rocks, hot plasma scrapes across your left shoulder and you stumble hard. Your knees hit the surface as you hiss, stinging pain surging up your body, and you crawl the rest of the way with your head down, until you can push the bag across the floor and crouch yourself behind a support beam.

You peek around and watch as Mando stumbles too, turning one last time to drive the forked end of the rifle into the chest of a Weequay. The village behind him blazes as he sprints to the ship, swivelling on his feet to fire a few final shots into the distance at the offenders. He lands each one without struggle, and finally barrels into the hull and up the ladder, the ramp closing not two seconds later.

The blood stains your sleeve, and the ship starts to move.

***

“Hey… hey.”

A quiet and resounding hum surrounds you. You blink, looking right, left, then forward at the Mandalorian crouching in front of you. Your hands still covering your face, he tentatively reaches out, wrapping his fingers around your wrists.

You shiver— how much time has gone by? A minute, an hour?

Mando shifts a touch, guiding your hands away from your face. The dark hull is illuminated by one or two lights, reflecting weakly against his armour. The other armour lays just across the floor.

Your eyes have puffed, your lashes still damp, your cheeks hot.

“You’re hurt,” he remarks, and as he says it, your body’s acknowledgment of it returns, the pain stripping away what comfort you felt seconds before. His hand brushes against the other shoulder to check for another wound, gently urging you to sit up more. It feels warm despite the layer of leather separating you from his bare skin, but his approach remains methodical, purely for safety.

You whine involuntarily. The sound escapes in a soft breath, but it’s a whine nonetheless, and your body screams in protest— every muscle sore, the wound on your shoulder stinging.

“Are you okay?” His helmet ceases to move, the visor tilted directly into your line of vision when he asks. His body covers most of the view behind him— your head feels light, woozy, and you’re not certain if what you’re remembering is even real.

“Uh… mhm,” you hum. It’s not blood loss making you ditzy, but the panic of before, exhausting you of the energy to speak much. You can move if you want to, and you can move if you tried, but it’s the second last thing you feel like doing. The first: dealing with the wound. "Do you have any..."

“I’ll get the med kit.”

Scanning around the room as he wanders off, you notice all the things you’d already seen before; the armoury, the panels. “Where are we going?”

“I set the course for my next bounty on Tatooine,” he replies over his shoulder, pausing his movements. “I’m… sorry for what happened to your home.”

Your home… oh.

The place you know like a map in your mind from everyday spent exploring, searching for valuables. And the trading post— gone and vacant. What would you do now? Does Mando just expect you to disappear off into the wastelands on Tatooine? You don’t say a word in return, neither do you move. You let the loss burn a hole into you like the one in your sleeve. It’s small, not terribly big, but there’s something missing. You can’t deny that you’d wanted to leave Nevarro, but not like this. Not in this state.

Faintly, you hear him rummaging through a stash somewhere, and you spare a glance at your shoulder— red, wet, and swollen. You grimace, pulling further into yourself on the hard floor.

He speaks gently when he returns, tearing into a medkit and fishing out a packet of bacta gel. The ship’s humming becomes louder, and the sight of the medicine makes you recoil, briefly lifting you from dazedness. "This'll sting. You'll... be fine."

Despite the fact that you're dreading this, you find a sliver of ease in the careful lilt of his voice, the rumbling depth. He must realize you're not used to things like this. Things like danger beyond a slip and fall or a bargain with the wrong person.

He takes a knee before your trembling body, and you timidly grab the packet from his extended hand, squeezing the jelly-substance onto your skin.

"Breathe."

Sucking in, you close your eyes, attentive to his guidance.

The gel heats up over the shallow gash in your arm when you first touch it, your muscles seizing, lip caught in your teeth. Your fingers glide along as lightly as possible, but more tears well in your eyes from the sharp sensation— you hiss, clamping your free hand into a fist until your bones hurt.

Mando's boot is planted just shy of your thigh. "Easy there..."

Blinking away the new tears, you focus on him between the shutters of black. He's remarkably still, shoulders shrouding you from the vastness of the hull and keeping you closed into your small grasp of comfort. You pick out your face in the reflection of his helmet as he looms, avoiding your gaze by studying the wound instead.

He knows you're watching.

The Mandalorian was the one who handled everything— but he seems so undisturbed. Like it was his element, and he doesn't mind giving even just a little of his store of medicine to you.

It's too... quiet. But you don't know what to say. Each stroke slower than the last, you will yourself to cover the wound completely without giving up, another groan bursting from your chest.

"That's good." He inspects just an inch closer, causing your breath to hitch on a hiccup. "Just a little more," he motions to the left. "There."

You rub the rest in with his encouragement, and soon the sensation of pain dwindles, your mind and body finally soothed. Letting your head fall back, you look up at the ceiling, the ridges in it fascinating in your odd state of ache turned to tranquility.

“Thank… you.” You squirm— although the bacta helps, you’re still shaken up on the inside, the events of the day too much, too fast for you to process yet. It hurts at the same time that it doesn’t; you’re tired, and you’re infinitely upset, but it doesn’t register as real.

“Thank you for bringing me the beskar,” he murmurs back, the sound so melodic you could fall asleep to it. “I owe you.”

“Owe me?” What does he owe you? He traded with you, he aided you with your job. Problem was only that… your source of credits got taken away on Nevarro. But that’s not his to deal with.

Mando stands, and you watch him closely as he puts the medpack away, turning back to you. You hold your gaze up to his, the pace in your chest kicking up. His thighs are nearly level with your face, sturdy muscle under the guards.

“We can strike a deal.” His hands find his belt, thumbs tucking into it. “I move a lot. I have bounties to hunt.”

“Yes.”

“And you’re a scav. A good one.”

“Also yes.” You narrow your eyes, and nerves swirl idly in your stomach when you think back to Krall. He’s okay, you tell yourself. Things will be normal again.

“We can help each other out until the post is rebuilt.”

Mando backs away, resting his back against the wall opposite to you, each movement leisurely and intentional.

You pause, confusion manifesting in the expression of your face. “What do you mean?”

“Your credits we can use for food and necessities. Mine will go toward fuel and repairs. Meet halfway.”

Your brows raise, and your stomach bottoms out at the prospect. Is this some part of his honour code— is that why this is happening? Is he saying what you think he’s saying…?

“How would you like to scavenge around on some new planets?”

#din djarin x reader #din djarin #din djarin x you #the mandalorian #the mandalorian x reader #the mandalorian x you #pedro pascal #pedrostories #star wars #the mandalorian fanfic #pedro pascal characters #usermarshal #useran #revised nov 1

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