Work Text:
Medrit Vasur had many habits Boba Fett found interesting , as far as he allowed himself to find his gracious hosts’ habits a diversion. Boba was not close with the man, being rather an intimate of his husband, Goran, but the only habit of Vasur’s; and he never addressed the man by his first name in the privacy of his own mind, that Boba found offensive was that of receiving personal mail.
Being a blacksmith—an artisan—by profession, Vasur had many friends among the artists of Manda’yaim (Boba insisted on thinking in Mando’a as much as he could now that he had to make a concerted effort to properly speak it, as much as to make life on Mandalore easier as it was to please his granddaughter, he rationalized). Among the many hobbies and peccadilloes of the artistic community on Mandalore was their delight in sending handwritten notes on flimsi delivered by messenger.
There was no formal delivery service on Mandalore. Shipments were made to major cities and towns, and picked up from there by their intended recipients. This suited most Mando’ade , as they had no interest in their private homes being recorded. It meant that for time-sensitive deliveries and mail , private messengers were often used. These messengers were as often a young relative sent to run errands as professionals with speeder bikes modified to pass the speed limitations kept on most “civilized” planets, but professional messengers did exist, and unfortunately, they often dropped off letters for Vasur.
Boba, having few diversions of his own, was fond of spending his mornings waiting for the sunrise with a cup of caf and tabbac. He was retired after all, and allowed his personal vices, like boredom for its own sake. Being so close to Keldabe meant that Goran and Medrit’s farm was on the first leg of the trip most messengers made out of the city. Which meant that Boba Fett was unfortunately faced with receiving Medrit’s mail for him, since, while Medrit rose as early as Boba did, he was still a working man—unlike Boba—and busy from morning to dusk.
It was a particularly beautiful morning, the third day of the twelfth of the fifteen months on Manda’yaim . Boba was quietly staring into the lavender sky of the predawn, the only sounds the quiet slurping of his caf and occasional strike of his lighter, while the clouds that often covered the sky so near Keldabe and MandalMotors caught flame as the sky slowly lightened. A few stars and planets of the system were visible even as the sun rose. Manda’yaim had some of the least light-polluted skies Boba had ever had the opportunity to see, and he savored the inky nights transfixed by the belt of the galaxy as much as he could.
It was of course, at the multicolored climax of the dawn, that he heard the distant sound of a speeder bike grow ever closer. Boba did not react. Years of suppressing the human instinct to respond to stimuli had numbed him to excessive physical displays, though he still had an absolutely awful sabacc face, too used to the endless years of wearing his helmet constantly. He was frowning with great enthusiasm when the speeder bike’s sound hit its climax, a few klicks out from the ranch, and did so with even more gusto as the ‘bike pulled up, the messenger dismounting.
They were slim, and wore light, sky blue beskar and padding, just enough beskar reinforced weave to keep their body together if they were flung from a ‘bike going about 450 km/h. Boba frowned even harder when instead of leaving the mail in the quaint wrought mailbox that Medrit made, they decided to walk up the neat path to the porch, clearly intending to leave the mail with the one being awake enough in the house to sit outside it.
By the time they got close enough to see any detail in Boba’s face, their steps almost faltered at his expression, but they gamely continued onwards. They almost certainly recognized him, even out of armor, as there were few enough true Fett clones who had lived this long, and in as good shape as Boba, on Mandalore. Boba wasn’t egotistical enough to assume the messenger wanted to see him up close. No, they clearly just had the work ethic to go out of the way to make sure whatever silly letter (though of course Boba never read them before they got into Medrit’s hands) it was, was safely delivered, stormy expression on Boba’s face or no.
Nothing, he found, would encourage the messengers to leave him alone on these glowing mornings, and he quietly sighed as he had to properly tear his eyes from the sky to watch the messenger dally at the porch steps, clearly wondering whether they should leave the mail there, or hand it to Boba. Boba quirked an eyebrow as they approached, and was relieved when they made the right decision and left the note on the steps.
Yes, he thought, it is an exceptional morning , as the towering clouds were deliciously painted gold and pink and orange against the approaching blue sky. His brow smoothed as the messenger got on their ‘bike and gunned it as quickly as they dared. What a perfect morning. Perhaps he would pick up art too, and paint, though as he toyed idly with the fantasy he knew it to be nothing but that. A boring retirement suited him quite well.