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Chapter Text

Among one particular generation of the Shriek-Hawk Jedi initiate clan, Bruck Chun is the first to join the Force, dead as a Jedi initiate after being manipulated by a fellow Telosian and a former Jedi padawan, Xanatos du Crion, to bomb the Coruscant temple.

The rest managed to attain knighthood, and even mastery for some, but it is worth nothing. They still died far too early. Mostly in a senseless galactic war that broke out a mere couple of decades after Bruck’s death – within it, or during the wholesale betrayal that ended it.

Obi-Wan Kenobi was the last, killed by his own former padawan learner turned Sith apprentice whom he had not managed to kill at the end of the war. A hopeless, tired, broken hermit, by the time of his death, having lived in a desert for close to two decades, spending much of his time being “crazy old Ben” to the populace.

Then, together, they watch the Empire that rose from the ashes of the Jedi Order and the Republic and so many other peoples die, to be replaced by a pale imitation of the Republic that almost immediately struggles to do anything.

Together, they watch as the struggle dies in the second, more permanent death of the Jedi Order, newly resurrected.

Together, they watch as the New Republic tears into each other, and remnants of the Empire gleefully, whole-heartedly take the chance to swoop in.

Together, they watch as the galaxy is plunged into yet another civil war, tired yet no less vicious and painful for that.

The Sith are no more, then, but so is what makes the galaxy a collective civilisation.

The watchers cry out, so does the Force, so do countless beings dying slow, agonising deaths by starvation, disease, war, enslavement, desperate violence as the galaxy shrinks and withers.

`The Sith and the Jedi caused this,` one observes, then.

`The Ruusan Reformation caused this,` another refutes.

`The Battle of Galidran started this,` yet another points out.

`No, it’s Jinn’s death. Dooku loved him,` a fourth snorts, rather derisively.

`No, the Mandalorian Excision did,` a fifth jumps in before an argument could break out, sparked by that inflammatory tone.

`Nah, it’s what Mandalorians did to Cathar, and what Revan’s faction did in reaction,` a fifth argues. `The Sith benefited, all the while.`

`Mandalorians. Jedi. Sith.` all agree, in the end; even those who have not spoken before.

Hindsight is truly the clearest sight of all, it seems, especially when observed from within the Force like this. And it is karking, kriffing, fucking, shab’la bitter to swallow and digest.

`What can we do?` is the next question, naturally, followed by, `What shall we do?`

Suggestions and arguments pour out and clash with each other, in response, even as the galaxy they tether themselves to in the space-time continuoum continues to degenerate messily, agonisingly.

Members of the Shriek-Hawk Jedi initiate clan are – were – chosen and grouped together because, most of all, they are curious, free-spirited beings, and this shows in the debate that lasts until there are only a double handful of true civilisations left from the previous trillions.

Everything is relative in the Force, though, including time and space, especially when one is bodiless, already dead. So, once they all agree with each other, once they have seen and noted all that they wish to see and try to change within the – frayed, fraying, tangled, tangling, dimmed, dimming – tapestry of the Force, regardless of the said time and space, they link their presences together with each other, tightly, and push.

Because they cannot affect changes now, but they can do it before, and they will.

Chapter Text

Peaceful life in the Coruscant temple, especially when experienced through a little child’s body, feels alien after what seems like an eternity of heartbreak and grief and violence and death. This particular generation of the Shriek-Hawk Jedi initiate clan, having melded with their far-younger selves in their far-younger bodies, do their best in navigating such life, but people still remark about it: too quiet, too mature, too studious, too serious, too secretive, too comfortable together and not reaching out elsewhere, too attached one to another….

That last point, the High Council does try to do something about, namely by assigning each member different child-appropriate occupations for each day under different council members, under different crèchemasters, under different free and willing knights all across the temple.

But the clanmaster reports that they still make time to meet, to talk, even to play with each other, however late it is in the night cycle, however tired they are, and their bond with each other is strengthened instead by this. So the High Council attempts to disband the current Shriek-Hawk Jedi initiate clan altogether, dispersing its members among different clans until they are thirteen, and reopen it only for the next generation of initiates.

All nine members of the clan raid the stores and evade all attempts to even see them, in response. The only comfort anyone could take from this is that their classroom assignments are turned in on time and the pantries as well as the kitchens are regularly – if undetectably – raided for easy-to-store, easy-to-carry, easy-to-make foods and rations.

“Free-spirited beings, indeed!” members of the High Council rue the designation of the clan. Half of them therefore suggest that this designation be struck out and replaced when assigning new initiates to this clan. And a few others suggest that there be no longer any specific designations for Jedi initiate clans.

When this matter is brought to the crèchemasters and clanmasters, Jedi Master T’ra Saa – the founder and first clanmaster of Shriek-Hawk Jedi initiate clan, even though she has not been clanmaster to this particular clan for centuries – reasonably points out that this problem occurs only after the High Council attempted to forceably separate the nine clanmates and did not seek to delve into the roots of what made the children so attached to each other and wary of outsiders.

“What would you have us do, then?” the High Council asks through various iterations and permutations – and, to some, a certain irritation.

“Talk to them, with no judgement,” Jedi Master Ali-Alann says, with a nod and a brush of acknowledgement in the Force towards his colleague. “Children are impressionable, but they are not unthinking, Masters, nor unreasonable, if you could get them to understand.”

The veiled criticism stings.

It is received, however, and the hunt for the initiates begin anew, this time involving fellow initiates from other clans.

“We just wish to talk to them. There will be neither punishment nor chastisement involved,” the High Council promises.

Initiate Depa Billaba of Clan Nexu, Initiate Kit Fisto of Clan Clawmouse, Initiate Agen Kolar of Clan Rancor and Initiate Tiplar of Clan Hawkbat bow almost in unison and file out of the High Council chamber when dismissed.

“Such polite and proper initiates,” some remark when the chamber is once more empty but for its original occupants.

“Are they going to be badly influenced by those rapscallions instead?” others fret.

“Maybe it is a sign that we need to change?” a few point out tiredly, long expecting a negative answer but still trying.

And, like before, these few are once more ignored.

Especially when comes the news that nobody – not the crèchemasters and clanmasters, not the temple guards, not the available knights and masters and padawans, not the children’s fellow initiates – can find the missing initiates, not even in the long-abandoned levels of the temple.

A handful of initiates from other clans are missing, too, instead.

Those who were called to the High Council chamber, in fact, plus Initiate Tiplee – the twin sister of Initiate Tiplar, who has been put in Clan Krayt-Dragon.

The temple guards instead find something else that is deeply concerning the lower under the temple they go in their search – which is low indeed, the lowest in fact, because fourteen younglings aged five to thirteen are missing.

The Dark haunts the lower levels of the Jedi temple.

And it thickens the lower they go.

The temple is shaken to the core. Figuratively and nearly literally. And, in the chaos, the disappearance of fourteen younglings is briefly put aside.

Briefly, just briefly, the High Council hopes, promises, tells everyone, while they search for a way to neutralise the Dark crouching literally right beneath their feet.

Chapter Text

A child’s body and mind have definite limits. The nine “original crew” of the runaway Jedi initiates have found this out the hard way since they arrived back in the very there Coruscant temple of the very there Jedi Order. Their more limited energy and muscle strength as well as their shorter attention and more quickly changing emotions are one of them. The lack of regard by adults for their words and actions is another.

These effects got worse when they at last brave the galaxy at large alongside their five companions: friends and colleagues from another life that is no longer there, that will never be there if they got any say in it.

They found an unusually large starfighter – more like an elongated, streamlined, very-well-armed gunship sans boarding ramp, really – of Mandalorian make but unknown class in a hidden hangar that Obi-Wan had found a lifetime ago. They slowly but surely stocked it up while they went missing from their dormes, using the equally unfamiliar – and ancient – stasis pods apparently doubling as medi-pods stacked at the rear of the starfighter as storerooms – well, most of them, that is, as Bant insisted they leave at least one free for just in case. When their old-new – or new-old? – friends reported what the latters had been tasked by the High Council, they thought that it was prime time to go away from the temple for a while, at least until the High Council no longer seeks to scatter them permanently into different clans. And the first hurdle immediately greets them, by way of the fact that no spacecraft is ever built to be operated by small to tiny beings – not without many modifications – and the Force somehow feels… muffled, in here. The Coruscant Space Control’s scepticism and suspicion only exacerbates it, when Agen – the eldest in their new crew, bodily speaking, though sadly still boyish-sounding, as zabraks develop slower than humans – requests permission to jump into the Perlemian Trade Route; not as a Jedi initiate, of course, as the original crew have explained and stressed and implored, seeing that none of them would like to be the target of opportunistic slavers and would-be slavers.

“What’s a kid doing flying in an unknown fighter?”

It is truly unfortunate that they happen to contact a sentient instead of a droid among the space control crew; a nosy and seemingly concerned one, at that.

Obi-Wan takes point, then, pushing aside a scowling and uncertain Agen. “We’re meeting up with our parents,” he fibs in Mando’a, going with the Mando’a script the texts in this ship are written on.

“Huh,” the space control worker grumps confusedly, tiredly. “Not paid enough to deal with your shenanigans, kids.”

“Let us pass, then,” Agen calls from behind Obi-Wan, with unfeigned irritation and petulance barely masked by politeness.

“Your purpose, please,” the being at the other end of the comm snips back, deliberately prim and proper. Then, much less prim-and-properly, they add with heavy emphasis, “Not gonna be involved with a couple of kids playing truant in dad’s ship.”

“We are going to our parents,” Obi-Wan matches the controller’s tone, in a general Mando’a accent he learnt a lifetime ago, after mastering the language. “They will come find us if we are not on time.”

“They’re going to sell us away,” Depa predicts grimly the moment they can at last jump into hyperspace.

“Definitely,” Quinlan grins toothily.

Agen snorts. “Midgets,” he huffs, “if I knew you’d be this reckless, I would’ve get Master Saa to come with us… or, better yet, lock you in your dorms till you got more sense of self-preservation.”

“Why Master Saa?” Siri cocks her head.

“Take it back!” Bruck growls.

“You wouldn’t, would you?” Quinlan grins wickedly. “It’s too interesting without an adult around. Admit it.”

Agen growls back, and… well, suffice to say, it is quite fortunate that most of the starfighter, even its interior, have been built unusually quite sturdily and durably.

It is quite unfortunate that the starfighter is still mainly a starfighter and thus smaller than a real passenger ship, though, because some innocent bystanders got accidentally kicked or punched and got dragged into the brawl that way.

This vigorous activity strains the life support, too, making the automatic alarm shriek its displeasure.

In fact, it is the only reason the brawl stops.

Chapter Text

The issue of the straining life support system, also the need for fuel, drops Whistling Bird 3 – the starfighter Clan Shriek-Hawk and company pilfered – on Brentaal 4, far earlier than they wished. Agen and Garen take point in negotiating for fuel and an upgrade to life support system with Depa and Kit guarding their respective backs, while a begrudgingly agreeing Bruck and Aalto and a contented Tiplar and Tiplee guard the ship and supervise the fuel transference and upgrade installation. Obi-Wan and Quinlan search for credits and valuables they can liberate from people visiting the spaceport who can survive missing some, in the meantime, as Reeft does his best to hack into the bank accounts of corrupt politicians he still remembers from a lifetime ago from various public terminals all over the spaceport, guarded and aided by Siri. And Luminara and Bant use this chance to get sticky-fingered on supplies they will and might need that are… unattended, mostly rations and bacta, which they liberate mostly from the few smuggling vessels and the more numerous private yachts of the rich the Force leads them to.

Whistling Bird 3 zooms away from Brentaal 4 alongside a whole fleet of other spacecrafts just before the spaceport is closed for investigation of various account leaks and missing things as demanded by enraged wealthy beings.

Safely in hyperspace once more, now travelling along the Hydian Way, the officially newly expanded Clan Shriek-Hawk – regardless of if the Jedi Order will ever accept them again – share their stories, findings, difficulties and suggestions based on their respective tasks on Brentaal 4, even as they arrange their new supplies according to categories, their needs, storage needs and expiration dates.

And then, when everything is finished and they have found seats on various crates that now serve as additional walls, additional floor and additional seats, come the less immediate but more important points.

The fact that the original members of Clan Shriek-Hawk are all time travellers is the most important bit to share. The state of the galaxy in the future that is hoped never to be is the next one, alongside whatever individual stories the nine deign to share.

“What should we tackle first?” Agen says into the long, heavy, deafening silence that ensues.

Reeft stares, and he is not the only one among the nine doing so. “you believe us?”

Agen cocks his head quizzically, and he is not the only one among the rest doing so. “Why not?”

Obi-Wan shakes his head, chuckling in hysterical mirth muted only by exhaustion. “We dreaded it, dreaded telling you, and it’s… just… anticlimactic.”

Siri snorts. “We can do with a calm lifetime, you know. Easy things are nice treats. Don’t complain, Obi.”

“Lifetime,” Depa repeats, bemused, thoughtful, intrigued.

“We sent ourselves to this timeline, and the Force let it,” Aalto shrugs.

“You think you can do that again after you die this time?” Kit perks up, looking and sounding torn between morbid curiosity, envy and wonder.

Bant shakes her head. Her voice wobbles in grief and soul-deep exhaustion when she says, “Dunno. I’d rather rest, myself. I agreed to come here just because I hoped it could be better this time.”

“We’d like to be together,” Garen adds, correcting her with a sad but fond smile. “The war showed us how precious our initiate years were.”

“I Fell,” Quinlan states bluntly, eyes hard, alien on his young face, only eight standard years old. “Once when I was five, and once during the war. My attachments saved me. Yoda’s wrong. Somebody can return from the Dark. And I wasn’t the only one.”

Tiplar and Tiplee hug each other sidewise after that proclamation, relieved and vindictive and bitter, now reunited in truth after three years spent in different clans because, “You must learn to live without each other, Initiate. One day, you will be sent individually and separately in missions, and such attachment would cripple you before the mission even began.”

Heavy silence once more falls on the gathering, remembering their own individual experiences with the “No Attachment” rule.

And then, “What we’re taught, it’s all a lie, then?” Depa asks, deceptively calmly.

Bant shakes her head. Luminara shrugs. Bruck snorts.

“The old meaning of ‘passion’ is ‘suffering’,” Obi-Wan offers, but a little hesitantly. “We never talked about this. The Order, I mean. But it’s true. So the passion mentioned in the Sith Code…”

“…It’s ‘suffering’, not ‘feelings’,” Depa finishes, humming thoughtfully.

Tiplar huffs. Tiplee nudges her twin’s side.

“It still doesn’t solve the question of what we’re to do now,” Tiplar defends herself.

“Well, I’d rather we not steal again,” Aalto speaks into the resulting pause.

“No, we could be caught,” Quinlan agrees.

He continues when Aalto gives him a flabbergasted, scandalised look, “We did our best. We didn’t take from those who needed the money or the valuables. But we pissed off rich and powerful people, so we must stay down for now. This is enough, anyway. We just have to ration things to make it last.”

“And never stay in one place,” Garen supplies, albeit rather reluctantly and uneasily. “Might be good if we got a bigger ship. Obi and Bant can pilot this one, if we don’t want to lose it. I could pilot the other, and Quin can become my copilot.”

It’s Agen’s turn to hum thoughtfully. And then, “If you teach us the language used in this craft and the one Obi used with the controller, I can help pilot this. You nine can go with the bigger ship, then.”

Gratitude is palpable in the somewhat stale air in the starfighter, not from just Garen, and Agen fails to hide a pleased smile both on his face and in the Force.

Well, their most immediate aim is apparent, then: Learn Mando’a.

It is much better than grumbling about having to walk and sleep and sit on hard, bumpy, uneven crates and containers in a space not quite enough for fourteen children and their supplies.

Chapter Text

Being able to stretch one’s legs and breathe easily and soak in natural sights and some good sunlight – and swim, too, for Bant and Kit – is a must, when one spends at least two rotations at a time aboard a spacecraft that doesn’t really fit and barely supports them.

Clan Shriek-Hawk is no different. Their childish energy, requirements and tendencies only make this need even more dire, in fact. So they choose every chance they can have for a break gladly. As wisely as they can measure it, too, by picking uninhabited meadows and beaches and valleys and mountain plateaus for the little holidays.

They can’t always avoid civilisations, and they in part don’t wish that. They trade the valuables little by little in random locations, always fronted by a different clan member, guarded from hiding by another, though the ones negotiating for fuel, supplies and spare parts for system tune-ups are always the same: Agen, Garen, Kit and Depa. But, here, they are most serious and on guard, knowing full well how precarious their situation actually is, thus unable to enjoy themselves as they truly wish.

It is how they manage to catch and hold a surprisingly very stealthy somebody toting a sturdy pack nearly as tall and wider than they are snooping so near to their ship, in fact.

Their name is Pre Vizsla, they are almost seven standard years old, and they wear a pair of Force-suppressing cuffs on their wrists, visible in a flash when they are adjusting the straps of their pack.

“Why did you come here?” Obi-Wan the interrogator, ushering the child to under Whistling Bird 3 to get out of casual observation by other spaceport goers, asks in Mando’a, following the introduction he managed to pry out of the said child.

“Why’re you wearing those Force-suppressing cuffs?” Quinlan, loitering nearby, chimes in in Basic, more seriously than his wont. “S’not a good way to get away from the Force long term, y’know. Could go very dependent on it, then you go mad. Or somebody forced them on you?”

Pre shrinks in on themself – himself? – and doesn’t answer for the longest time. Doesn’t look at anyone, either, and hunches in on… himself. But he does speak, after a while, just as Siri and Luminara are returning from their mission trying to sell a pair of earings from their list of valuables. In a basic Basic, at that, though his accent makes Basic sounds like Mando’a.

“I want shelter. I want go away from this place. I can pay. This Mando ship. You speak Mando’a. What your clan? No tell anyone, please. I in danger. My parent kill… killed my other parent. He want his ally train me. My other parent say not good train with… with dar’jetii. I run away from home. No longer home. I Vizsla, but there, no home.”

“Dar’jetii,” Obi-Wan swears quietly.

Pre is silent, too busy trying not to cry – again, judging by those reddened eyes on his human – or near-human – face.

Obi-Wan doesn’t need the confirmation, anyway, neither do his clanmates when he and Quinlan report about Pre and what happened to send the child running.

“Disarm, please,” Luminara requests in a polite but firm tone in stumbling Mando’a when Pre comes on board, his inclusion unanimously if hesitantly approved by the clan. “We want to help you restore your connection to the stars, too.”

Pre hesitates on the horizontal hatch behind the cockpit that is one of the ways in and out of the clan’s current home.

“We are all Stars-touched,” Bant calls calmly from below in the same language. “Nine of us can use our power well already. Our apparent ages lie. Nine of us aren’t truly children.”

That makes Pre scuttle back from the lip of the hatch.

Reeft sighs. Bruck snickers.

“You amuse yourself on me,” Pre barks, audibly hurt.

“No,” Obi-Wan hastens to say, leaping up to crouch beside a hunching Pre. “I swear, no. We all use our Stars-given power, and nine of us have… special backgrounds. We are children, but not really children.”

“You don’t make sense,” Pre gripes, inching farther away from the hatch towards the squat cannon turrot above the cockpit.

“This is not a trap for you; truth, honour, vision,” Obi-Wan swears, thumping his fist to the centre of his chest. Then, when Pre only looks barely mollified, he adds frankly, “We are wary of you instead. We wonder if you are a trap for us. So, please disarm until your connection to the Stars is restored and we are certain you are not a trap, whether by your own volition or another’s.”

“Will it hurt?”

“At first. But we can do it slowly, and we will be with you all the way. We can teach you so it won’t hurt again, too.”

“It won’t?”

“Yes.”

And, just so, the clan is added by one.

Chapter Text

After Pre’s induction, Clan Shriek-Hawk switches hyperroutes as quickly as possible, then leaves it altogether, to throw off any potential pursuers. No visit to civilised areas, either. Fortunately, they still got plenty of supplies, and a ready occupation, namely helping Pre slowly but surely get accustomed again to a ready and open connection to the Force.

It is not always serious and painful and sorrowful, too. Some are even fun. Crèche games are like that.

And, like crèchelings everywhere and everywhen in the Jedi Order since the Ruusan Reformation, these games glue all members of the clan fast to each other, regardless of backgrounds. Thus, it does not take long for the fourteen earlier members of the clan to tell Pre about their lives before this unexpected, unending hyperlane trip, including the nine’s “special backgrounds.” It does not take long for Pre to share the information and looks of the contents of his humongous pack, in return, which the rest only knew as safe for them all, as it contained neither explosives nor gasses harmful to them or their environments, and it still doesn’t.

The adult Mandalorian full armour pieces inside – which Pre claims he would have inherited anyway  – do not surprise anyone. It wins Pre their approval for his forethought, in fact. The rations of food and water and currencies, his cash of weapons that he can truly wield, and his practical, versatile changes of clothes, likewise. And other things that are his keepsakes are understandable.

The Darksabre does surprise them, though.

“Oh, damn, Pre, you got balls,” Quinlan blurts out. Thankfully in Basic, according to many of his clanmates. But he immediately gets a verbal chorus of censure plus admonishing flicks through the Force from Siri, Luminara, Bant, Depa, Agen, Obi-Wan, Aalto and Reeft, anyway, even as Bruck and Garen guffaw and Kit giggles and the twins gape.

And Pre asks – in the same language – what balls Quinlan means because this is a laser-sword, not a ball, let alone multiple balls.

Siri thrashes Quinlan in an impromptu spar, for that. And Obi-Wan quickly slides the rest into a new topic, in the meantime, namely the structure and regulations and methods of the Jedi Order post-Reformation, especially how Force-sensitive foundlings are found or deliberately searched for and raised by the Jedi.

Well, fortunately, Pre is distracted.

But, unfortunately for Obi-Wan, Pre asks, “You are all Vizslas, then?” when Obi-Wan comes to the name of the nine’s original Jedi initiate clan, and how the five originating from different clans were inducted. His Basic still stumbles and thick with Mando’a accent, but it is far better than before, and so are the fourteen others with their Mando’a, as they have agreed to speak alternatingly so they all can learn and practise a new language.

Obi-Wan shakes his head to the half-hopeful question, and tries to hide the twist of contempt-revulsion-anger-sorrow in his heart in response to that name from outside kenning.

Luminara jumps in before he can try to explain, thankfully. “No. It’s simply the name of an animal chosen by the founder and first clanmaster of our clan, Jet’baji T’ra Saa.”

“Not Jet’buir?” Pre probes, referring to the various based-on-meaning Mando’a translations the Jedi-raised children provided him earlier for the various functions in the Jedi Order.

Luminara sits up and opens her mouth, but Reeft hastens to explain, forefending her lecture, “Jet’buir is when one raises and teaches a specific learner until their education is finished. Master T’ra and other crèchemasters and clanmasters – children-raisers – only raise children until they are ready to train as warriors, farmers, teachers or healers.”

“No peace-speakers?” Pre cocks his head quizzically, surprisedly.

“And peace-speakers,” Reeft agrees while dodging a swot of Luminara’s hand. “But our warriors are supposed to be peace-speakers and peace-keepers, too, anyway. We call them knights.”

Pre snorts, unimpressed. Bant sighs ruefully and sadly in acknowledgement.

“We aren’t just the Republic’s attack dogs,” Aalto chimes in quietly. “I don’t want to be just the Republic’s attack dog, too. I became a temple guard because of that. At least then I could guard my own people and our home, in however limited capacity. I helped keep the peace, at least in my own home.”

“Home.” Pre’s voice unexpectedly breaks. And trauma, grief, sorrow, pain, betrayal and loss well up again in the Force, sourced from deep within him. He curls up tightly into himself, tucking his face into his knees and arms, but no tears fall.

Tears don’t fall anymore, after the first time he told the others about how his father had killed his mother for refusing to relinquish him to be taken and raised by a Sith, after the others helped him face it and try to make even just a little sense of it, though it’s still too new, too raw, too painful to come to terms with. The wound is still nearly as painful as before, nearly as fresh, but it is more… tired, now, wrung dry.

He wishes he could, though, when two different pairs of arms hug him from opposite sides, and two different Force-presences comfortably, comfortingly wrap themselves round his.

Siri and Quinlan.

They stopped their fight for him.

Chapter Text

It was supposed to be just a way to distract Pre from his – very natural, very understandable, but too overflowing – negative feelings. It is now Clan Shriek-Hawk’s future first – of many, hopefully – legitimate income.

Photography.

Pre is good at it. But, first and foremost, he loves it. And it is a way to honour his mother’s memory – his mother’s hobby of photography and the special camera he inherits from her – that everyone agrees won’t harm him in the long run.

He can squeeze out a handful of good angles to bring out the beauty of one place and make it as if he were in a handful of different places altogether. And the others cheer him on most heartily, each time. They give him tips and pointers just as enthusiastically, at that, especially in asking the Force to help find a good spot or angle to take a photo of.

It is a good way to entice him into meditating regularly, too, admittedly.

But then he decides to take photos of not just scenery but also animals… and he quickly goes up from small insects and mammals to bigger and bigger animals as he begins to get the hang of photographing animals.

And then he ups his subjects of photographs to carnivorous animals.

Big carnivorous animals. That scent or hear or look at children and think tasty snacks.

“Pre! You big idiot!” Kit squeaks as he and the subject of his ranting have to run from a pack of hungry nexu, whose nest has just been disturbed by a stone accidentally kicked by Pre’s foot when he attempted to get a better angle for his latest photograph.

Pre is too wheezy to retort verbally, but he does send Kit a petulant smack in the Force, flavoured with embarrassment, guilt, thrilling terror and fading shock.

Kit sends back a poke even as he leaps up a cliff, full of exasperation and terror and a smidge of reluctant admiration for the younger boy’s boldness.

“Everyone’s back in the ship already,” is what Depa exasperatedly, irritatedly says in greeting when both boys manage to get up the cliff, onto the plateau they newly set down on. “Come on.”

“How did you know?” Pre asks in Mando’a in-between gasps and wheezes as he bends down and braces his hands on his knees, his mind too scrambled to speak anything other than his native language.

“You are terrified, Pre, and you blast it loud and clear in the Force,” she points out, amused and concerned and still irritated, still exasperated. “If there’s anybody else nearby with a smidge of Force-sensitivity, they’d know, too.”

“Um,” Kit, less wheezy than Pre and less occupied than Depa, interjects warily, “I think there’s somebody, yes.”

The other two snap up straight in alarm and look towards where Kit is looking. Pre stifles a groan of complaint for the sudden dizziness and nausea from moving too fast, but both are rather forgotten when his stil-scrambled mind at last registers what he is seeing. His surprise and intrigue mingle with his two clanmates’.

There is a boy – or a young man? – at least a few years older than Kit, standing along the treeline to one side of the cliff not far from their little mobile home, garbed in stained and ratty mish-mash of clothes but clean for all that. Most of his facial features are shadowed under the hood of a tatty cloak, but his nervous, unsure smile is apparent both on his face and in the Force.

And so is the lightsabre hilt peeking out of the side of his cloak.

And he has the mind of a trained Force-Adept, even Jedi-trained, as recognised by Depa and Kit. A knight-level, at least, which is much – according to both – while this young.

The stranger bows neatly to them when he gets their full attention and they have had their full measure of him.

And then he introduces himself in one breath, in a soft voice that is more timid than anything else, “Hello, young ones. I am Jedi Knight Jon Antilles. I sensed your distress in the Force. Would you let me assist you?”

Chapter Text

Jon Antilles is sixteen and has been a Jedi knight for a year already.

Bruck calls bullshite on that. Most of the others disapprove of his strong words, but none deny their agreement with the gist of his ascertion.

“My master took me quite early and trained me the whole time,” is all he says, short but not brusque, his mind well-shielded but still radiating truth into the Force. “The High Council approved of my knighting.”

Bruck wants to say more, wants to test the purported knight in his antagonistic way, but more than one clanmate shush him both verbally and in the Force. They are well-practised in this, by now. Bruck is mentally the least mature of the nine, after all, given the time of his death and the fact they found that being literally one with the Force for so long apparently does not mature anyone’s personality.

Siri takes up the rein, instead. “What is your mission here, Knight Antilles?”

The nervous, unsure smile Depa, Kit and Pre were witness to makes a return on the very young knight’s face, which is still shadowed by his hood although all of them are now gathered in the grounded Whistling Bird 3, ready to take off any time the displeased wildlife make a bid for their tasty flesh. His reply is firm with quiet certainty, though: “I follow the Force’s will, and it led me to three of you.”

“The Force’s will,” Obi-Wan repeats, weighted in a remembered grief just as quiet. In the Force, in the bond the clanmates have established with each other, shielded from outside, he continues just as quietly, mindful of Bruck’s and especially Pre’s ages, `During the war, in one of my missions, on Queyta, he didn’t have to come, but he came, citing this same reason, and he died, and I lived instead.`

It shook his faith in the Force, or at least one of the instances of such, but he doesn’t say it.

Most of his clanmates understand, anyway, especially among the nine, especially those who were on the frontlines of the war the Sith engineered.

`We can try to change it,` Bant points out soothingly, ever the healer.

`It’s why we ran away, no?` Garen smiles.

`So he will be our new clanmate?` Pre asks, somewhat dubiously. `He is a grown-up already….`

Bruck scoffs. `No, stupid. He is still a teenager, knight or not.`

`Mandalorians have their first majority at thirteen, Bruck,` Obi-Wan swiftly rebukes him. `Don’t be too quick in judging people, especially if you don’t know the facts of the matter.`

`Aaaand, he notices us,` Quinlan breaks in before a fight got the chance to erupt.

And Jon does notice them, cocking his head in polite interest, with his eyes skipping between the fifteen children crammed in the space with him.

Obi-Wan clears his throat awkwardly, but falls speechless for once.

It’s instead Pre who pipes up, “Did ‘the Force’ tell you what to do?”

Jon shakes his head. “It doesn’t work that way,” he says, giving Pre a tiny but warmly genuine smile. “I got a… prompting, last month, and hitched a ride in a cargo ship destined for this planet, specifically the capital city on this continent. I hitched a ride in a speeder destined for the town on the other side of the mountain, then. And….”

“You hiked across the mountain?! For us?!” Depa cuts in, finishing for him, too flabbergasted and awed to care about niceties.

And Jon hunches in on himself, as if what he did were a bad thing.

Kit huffs and scrambles forward across their floor of now mostly empty crates of supplies. “Can I hug you?” he asks Jon when he has settled himself, crouching right in front of the older boy.

“I… suppose?” Jon hunches in even smaller, but something torn between bewildered longing and apprehension leaks out of a tiny crack in his shields that has just appeared, and Kit takes it as permission.

Pre and Depa follow not long after, when Jon is more used to positive touch. And, since Pre is one of the only two detractors, and Bruck is being lectured by – and losing against – the rest of the nine, and the vengeful nexu have managed to find them….

Well, some of the nine have done things worse and odder in their previous lifetimes than kidnapping a willing Jedi knight, none of the five complain about his inclusion right from the start, and Pre is making like a tooka kit in Jon’s lap at present.

Chapter Text

By now, it is not feasible anymore to live in Whistling Bird 3, despite the upgrades Clan Shriek-Hawk put on the life support system. Jon is thin, but tall, and nearly full-grown, as human males go. He takes up space that could have been filled by two more children, and the space was already full before he joined.

There are idle talks of adding more Force-sensitive children and youths to the clan, too, and sympathetic Jedi knights if they can swing it.

Idle words that nonetheless ring with truth in the Force.

So, in short, they need a new, bigger, preferably equally well-armed ship.

“This ship, I think most if not all of it are plated with beskar,” Jon muses aloud when the talk picks back up again, on their way to another barely inhabited planet, after a brief refuelling and resupplying stop. “It would be good as a training place for traumatised Force-sensitives. They wouldn’t be overwhelmed with the Force flooding in, but they could learn to reach out in increments, when the hatch to this ship is opened likewise.”

Pre hunches into himself, remembering his own experiences of wearing Force-suppressing cuffs in order not to be noticed by his father and what he had to endure to wean himself off of them. And, just so, Jon’s attention homes in on him, concern and realisation and guilt colouring the older boy’s Force-presence.

Tiplar jumps in, then, shielding Pre and distracting Jon, saying, “We should try to pick a big freighter, then, so this ship can be stored in it. That’d mean we can easily use this one and live in that one.”

“We should meditate to see where we can find such a ship,” Tiplee chimes in.

“Do you have to always do that?” Pre whinges, successfully brought out of his memories.

“We follow the will of the Force,” Tiplar parries, as usual among the fourteen Jedi-raised children.

And, also as per usual, Pre returns, “What about your own will? What about when you ran away from the temple?”

But, before the rote argument could go on, Jon jumps in, cocking his head in the equivalence of an eyebrow raised. “You never told me that: Why were you there alone? Where were your caretakers? And… running away from the Order?”

“No, just the temple,” Tiplee answers blithely, smiling, but does not elaborate.

Jon huffs and folds his arms on his chest, half-unsure, half-annoyed.

“And nobody found you already?” he probes, disbelieving.

Depa shrugs, looking a little disappointed and feeling so in the Force.

“They are busy.” Quinlan’s smile when he speaks up is rather condescending and poisonous. “They were busy trying to separate us into different clans because of their version of the non-attachment rule, when we were there. They must be busy with similar things, now. The Senate likes to assign Jedi to useless or murderous missions, after all.”

Jon looks and feels perturbed. None in the clan wish to probe into his reaction, though. What Quinlan has just said, if stronger than they are used to, is merely a fact of life to them by now; and, if Jon wishes to stay with them, he will soon be used to what the Core-based Jedi experience day by day, anyway, albeit through second-hand accounts.

Still, none ever considers how disturbing it might be to see such venomously deriding look on a child, and Jon is yet too new, too careful, too comfortable with the status quo to poke at the reason behind that overly mature expression.

Instead, he gets them to meditate together about a ship that would fit their needs and anyone they can help or take in, whichever comes first.

And it leads them to the planet Mustafar, to the nearly empty training – or torture? – facility steeped in the Dark and half-hidden under a lava river, to a very young zabrak male brimming with misery-longing-pain-loneliness-fear.

His name is Maul, and he is being raised as a Sith apprentice.

Chapter Text

Sorgan, the planet Clan Shriek-Hawk aimed to go before they were diverted to Mustafar, is in opposite sides of the Outer Rim with the “fireball” as a few of the clanmates put it, and the fuel in their mobile home sadly does not cover that distance. Besides, none among the clan wish to inflict harm upon the unwitting Sorgani. Not even Maul, although his reluctance is more like, “No, I don’t want to get caught and punished by my master, and I can’t even go hide in crowds or distract my master that way, there,” than anything else.

So they decide to make a stop on Llanic, the nearest planet to the middle of the way and the easiest to hide themselves in and muddle their tracks. And Pre persuades them to berth Whistling Bird 3 in the Mandalorian enclave there.

To no avail, though.

“I am a Mandalorian. You speak the language. we behave Mandalorian. Our ship is of Mandalorian make, coated in beskar too,” he insists impatiently, exasperatedly, using his native language to drive the point further.

“The ship is too noticeable. We would also be noticed, then. And which clan would we say we belong to?” Obi-Wan calmly ripostes in the same language. “You did so much to get away from your parent. Are you willing to chance discovery, now? Especially with the notion that the one who wanted to take you from your family may be the one who has been ‘raising’ Maul?”

Pre flinches and shuts up.

Arguing that little children are tasty prey on planets like Llanic but not in the way of the Nexu from a few planets ago, Jon takes it upon himself to deal with their ship’s entry, berth and refuelling. The usual ship-care crew protest mightily, of course, just as Pre did.

And, like Pre, they flinch and shut up when Jon calmly points out, “I am alone guarding you, for now. The oldest of you have lightsabres but neither skill nor experience yet to deal with such beings. The rest only have the crystals, or not even those, for good reason. What could I do to protect you if they noticed you when we got separated? What would they do if they knew there are sixteen children ripe for the taking here?”

The clanmates cannot even argue that he has no idea what the galaxy is like after just a year of knighthood, as he set foot in the Coruscant temple for the first time ever only during his knighting and never since. His experiences might rival those of the time-travellers’, in fact, despite him being an “ordinary” Force-adept.

But still, it chafes something fierce.

Five clanmates – Agen, Obi-Wan, Quinlan, Bruck and Kit – sneaking off to sell valuables is not so surprising, thus, not even to a resigned and fretting Jon. The only pieces of solace Jon and the rest can take are that they come back, alive and unhurt and free and untraumatised, and they have managed to sell all the remaining valuables they got from Brentaal 4 – a well-known smuggling planet has it’s perks, after all.

Well, and they bring home a Mandalorian adult by the name of Elta who radiates genuine concern in the Force, too.

They are a togruta, based on the shape of their helmet, with the emblem of Clan Eldar painted on their left pauldron and an unknown symbol – a pair of shriek-hawk wings flanking and attached to a vertically pointed hexagonal shield with a Mandalorian sword held upright on its middle – painted on the right pauldron.

And, “I found them tailed by known slavers,” is what they say – in Mando’a – in lieu of a greeting when Jon jumps down from the top hatch of whistling Bird 3 to greet them and the previously missing clanmates. “They are brave children, but they are still children and barely armed. Why were they not accompanied by warriors?”

“I am the oldest among us, and there is only one of me,” Jon replies tiredly; in Basic, as he has only so recently learnt Mando’a. “Thank you for bringing them back here. They snuck away from me while I was busy with the refuel and resupply. Did they bother you?”

Elta’s body language – folded arms, tilted helmet and all – clearly screams their disapproval and how unimpressed they are, even to one who is not accustomed yet to reading the expressions of fully armoured beings. The tone of their next words are level and neutral and not as firm as to be demanding, however, and it is not because they are now speaking in an accented Basic.

“Where are you going next? Are the supplies and fuel enough for all of you? I am in-between jobs, at present. I would like to escort you home, or wherever you and I deem safe.”

Jon gawps, startled.

And, perched on the top hatch, an eavesdropping Pre whoops and cheers.

Chapter Text

Unsurprisingly, Pre is among the few who wholeheartedly welcomes Elta’s presence.

Unsurprisingly, too, it takes more than words to convince the rest of their sincerity.

Also unsurprisingly, after they have removed their helmet and agreed to slave their ship to the clan’s without knowing where they are going as their first proof of intent, nobody among Clan Shriek-Hawk is willing to ride in their ship with them for various reasons. Not even pre.

But, surprisingly, they do not complain, or baulk, or try to take control or advantage in any way, or disbelieve. Not even when they find how remote and mostly uninhabited the destination is. Not even when they find that Jon is a Jedi knight. Not even when they find that everyone in the clan – named after a Mandalorian animal – is Force-sensitive. Not even when Quinlan not-accidental accidentally reveals that nine of the younglings – including himself, not-accidental accidentally – are time-travellers from a bleak, hopeless future that is hoped never to be. Not even when Obi-Wan – a seeming six-year-old – leads an expert interrogation on them regarding their background and opinions and intentions.

And, even more surprisingly, they then request, “What can I do to help you?”

They are a succinct being, unwasteful with words and always aiming to the point. The clan knows it well by now, also the words they do not say, namely: “I know you now, and you know me. Let us plan together for your futures, and I would only accept a ‘yes’ from you regarding this.”

Their Force-adeptness and battle prowess, which they have revealed somewhere during the interrogation, only lend more weight to the statement.

“You aren’t… freaked out, about us?” Bruck speaks up after a while, the first to do so among the clan arranged on a semicircle round Elta, in a timid voice that nobody among them has ever heard.

Elta tilts their head, bare ever since the clan firstly requested it, and regard him with a neutral look.

Fortunately for Bruck, they do not take long to say, “I would have done something far earlier, if I were ‘freaked out’ by any of you.”

“But you have your own life,” Depa points out, next, stammering. “I mean, if you’re helping us, you’ve most likely got to stay with us, and you’re a bounty hunter, and you got your duties to your clan, and… and… well, we aren’t profitable, since you’re not going to sell us? So how can you provide for your clan if you stay with us?”

Elta smiles sadly, to that. They have told the clan about their duty providing for Clan Eldar by bounty hunting instead of trading goods like most of their clan do, and that they have not returned to their clan’s stronghold – or what remains of it, they said, after the Annihilation – on Mandalore. But what they have not told this clan of little Force-sensitive children is: “I chose to help provide for my clan when there was a hard season for farming goods, which impacted the clan’s business and therefore income. One of my clanmates by marriage needed expensive medical care, as well, around that time, and it made the need for supplementary income much more immediate and dire. Then they passed away, and not long after the farms as well as our business began to recover, and since then I put money into our accounts only by habbit and as a way to let them know that I am still alive.”

Obi-Wan squirms, hesitates, opens his mouth, closes it again, and shrinks into himself when Elta’s fathomless black eyes are upon him. Only when they verbally prod him to speak does he say, also in a small, tentative voice that the others rarely hear from him, “Why don’t you want to return home or reconnect with them in other way, if I might ask? But, um, please, feel free to disregard the question, if it’s too personal for you, and I apologise for that, too.”

He shrinks even smaller when the togruta looks away, their features and Force-presence twisted in a tangle of rage-sorrow-pain-horror-bitterness-yearning.

But they answer, even if it takes a long moment to do so, and there is no condemnation of Obi-Wan in their voice and Force-presence and expression when they do.

“A few branches in the clan are Ka’ra-touched,” they explain heavily. “Mine is… or was… one of those. It started with my parent, who was Ka’ra-touched, and adopted me and two others, a pair of human twins, my little siblings by rather far.

“We were of the Manda’kara, and I still am despite everything, and they – our parent – taught us what they were taught. We grew, and we learnt, and we had the idea to continue the tradition of raising Ka’ra-touched children in our branch of the clan, if possible. We would not mind welcoming more Ka’ra-touched siblings, too, if our parent did not mind it. But we only had our cousins, and it was fine.

“Then, one day, I was helping find earthquake victims under the rubble on the other side of our homebase, and I found a young child who had no other relatives to speak of or care for them. We bonded almost instantly, and I somewhat jokingly nicknamed them Cin’dralyc, because they were so enamoured with my all-black attire but otherwise so bubbly and… just… radiant. My little siblings even gifted them an all-white blanket with that nickname stitched with bold black lettering on one corner of it.”

Elta stops, then, and hiccups a sob, and buries their face in their hands, and just weeps, the churning tangle of emotions in their Force-present even more apparent and potant now.

Clan Shriek-Hawk – and Jon is one, now, whether he verbally agrees or not, in their minds – look at each other both physically and in the Force, then, discomfited and aprehensive and sympathetically sorrowful, but hesitant to try to offer solace to the one “real adult” among them, cautious of what the repercussions might be for them.

But, in the end, tired with the uncertainty and deliberation, Bruck approaches Elta and weasels his way into their lap.

Bant follows suit, however reluctantly – her relationship with Bruck is still rather rocky, despite what they have gone through together – and the rest are not far behind.

They can guess the rest of the story, or Elta can tell them later. But, for now, Elta needs comfort from what their own memories have inflicted on them, and Clan Shriek-Hawk is rather well-versed in this kind of comfort.

Chapter Text

Elta never continues their story, and none in Clan Shriek-Hawk ever ask.

They are too busy training and playing and reading and exploring Elta’s ship and the surroundings and eating and sleeping and experimenting with things ranging from food to Force-skills to even remember the story, most of the time. With a knowledgeable, skillful, caring adult around, one who deliberately coaxes every positive bit of childhood instinct and habbit out into play no less, it becomes so easy to distract them.

It helps that, whenever they have their downtime, usually after eating and before they take a nap in the afternoon and longer sleeptime at night, they have a yet-inexhaustible topic, namely the Manda’kara. Which used to be a branch of the Jedi Order just like the Corellian Jedi and the Guardians of the Whills on Jedha and a few others. And these Jedi sect consisted – consist – of Mandalorians, as the name – Soul-of-stars – suggests. And Whistling Bird 3 turns out to be from a class of Mandalorian spacecrafts with very limited and restricted production, meant specifically for the Mando Jedi.

“So what we’ve been doing, all the sneaking and role rotations and… all, it’s all for nothing?” Bruck grumbles when that last point comes up.

Elta, seated nearby under their ship with Pre and Obi-Wan on their lap and Garen and Quinlan lying on the grass hugging each of their legs, gives him a head-roll that the clanmates are well aware by now as equivalent to a shrug.

“I heard nothing,” they say. “But I may have just been in the wrong place in the wrong time near the wrong people.”

“Doing the wrong thing?” Tiplar pauses on her whittling to pipe in, smiling tentatively, a little tremulously, though she tries to deliver her words teasingly. Bounty hunting really does not have a good image in the galaxy, especially for the Jedi, who oftentimes have to tangle with bounty hunters one way or another, and the stigma is inherited down the line to the smallest crèchelings as cautionary stories. And, to know that a Jedi – even one of another sect, a previously unknown one, who may have a slightly different set of rules and laws and all, who has been living in anonymyty alongside others in the self-same sect – bounty hunts for a living….

Elta gives her a head-tilt that means they are smiling, a physical smile in truth that reaches her eyes, and also the feeling of “It’s all right, I’m not offended, you’re all right” in the Force, for that, and she ducks her head, embarrassed and apologetic.

“Skilled, experienced Mandalorians can charge a lot, whether as a mercenary, a bounty hunter, a bodyguard, or simply a guard for a function or a building,” the togruta explains, then, if a little reluctantly, and all activities in the forest clearing that the clan has claimed as home this tenday cease, ears and Force-presences perking up.

“It was a source of quick money and a lot of it, and I already had a solid foundation on the basics, living away from the main clan as I and my family did, which necessitated a good way to defend ourselves and each other as early as possible,” they continue, in a heavier tone. “I built up my reputation and skills and connections, but I chose my jobs carefully. I still do. My parent said it would be a pity if I stopped after the clan did not need my contribution anymore, after the bad season passed, so I continued. I took guarding jobs, mostly, and hunts on known criminals. After my family died, what I choose became stricter, although it means hard weeks and months, sometimes. I need a way to honour them, so I just… went on. I need to honour the teachings passed down to me by my parent, also, and the name of the Manda’kara, even if it is no longer wise to show ourselves as such. My family paid the price for that knowledge.“

Their voice wavers near the end, and they stop entirely soon after, as they cuddle Pre and Obi-Wan close and bury their face in-between their heads.

“Ni ceta,” Tiplar whispers after a long, awkward, empathetically sorrowful silence that blankets the clearing thoroughly, her own voice small and wavering.

Nobody mentions that this is the closest Elta gets to picking up their life’s tale from before. They would never.

Elta is of their clan, now. They need not be alone anymore, whether physically or in bearing this burden of their past.

They may need a replacement for their old clanmaster, anyway, objectively speaking, and this adult is… not bad.

Not bad at all, in fact.

Chapter Text

Maul feels too anxious staying in one place for so long. His former master could have an easier time tracking him down if he were too comfy and too stationary, he feels. So Clan Shriek-Hawk moves, to his shock and badly disguised awe, even though the move is just to the other side of Sorgan for now.

“We need to relax for a little more time, Maul’ika,” Elta explains gently as they set up camp in a sandy beach bourdering an inlet sea with calm waves, speaking in Mando’a to get the new speakers more immersion time with the language. “You chose wisely when you came here. Few would look at this planet.”

They continue when Maul opens his mouth to interject, “True, we should not let ourselves fall too far into complacency. But Jon and I and the older children have the watch, Maul’ika, and we have discussed contingencies. We have drilled on them, also.”

He mutters lowly, and repeats himself in a louder voice only when they cock their head chastisingly at him, in a firm voice but stumbling Mando’a: “I want lightsabres.”

It is a wish that has been put forward by various clanmates for some time already, even before Jon’s induction. As it is, only Elta, Jon, Agen, Kit, Depa, Tiplar and Tiplee that possess the personally bonded crystals necessary for a lightsabre, and only Elta, Jon and Agen that possess working lightsabres, whether those are in pieces stored in various places on one’s person or hung openly on one’s belt.

But, while the clanmates just went back and forth with each other regarding this, sometimes falling into heated arguments or even brawls because of the self-same opinions they had put forward before, now Elta heads off the argument before it can even start.

“But do you need lightsabres at present? Does the time seem right to get your crystals? Where, if it is? Other than a lightsabre – which is flashy and distinctive – can you think of other weapons and defences that you can apply for yourself and others?”

Maul is not the only one who makes a face.

“We can train with mine?” Pre offers tentatively when the silence has stretched far.

“Not yours,” Obi-Wan mutters. “It’s Master Vizsla’s.”

“I am a Vizsla,” Pre parries, offended.

“Lightsabres are usually not inherited, Pre,” Luminara explains, picking carefully both through the language and her words. “And, if the stories are right, that sabre has gone through many hands, which aren’t always Vizslas. It’s… wrong.” She shudders, her expression and Force-presence pinched.

“Why?” Pre is baffled. “It is just like passing down armour, right? And lightsabre is just a weapon?”

“Will you pass your armour to an outsider, Pre?” Obi-Wan chimes in.

He continues when Pre squawks a firm, scandalised negation, “A lightsabre is more than that. More than a weapon, too. Every lightsabre has a crystal in it, as a conduit both of the Force and the plasma power. It can be a kyber, but it can also be some other crystal. What it is is a Jedi’s personal partner and a part of their identity. The crystal bonds only to one being, even if you are part of identical twins. And they are semi-sentient.”

Garen picks the thread up amidst Pre’s shocked spluttering on the last bit of Obi-Wan’s explanation. “It’s like the armour and the being in it. The armour is the casing of the sabre. The crystal is the being in it. And, well, you aren’t going to pass somebody to someone else’s care without their permission, right? Besides, the crystal holds some… echo, of the Jedi who partners with them, even if the Jedi is long dead, if the Jedi and the crystals bonded well with each other, especially if the bond lasted for a long time.”

Pre stares wide-eyed at the direction of his backpack, in which he still stores the Darksabre. He looks mighty ill, and feels likewise in the Force.

Given the reaction, Garen awkwardly tries to soothe him, saying, “Um, we can ask? I mean, you are Force-sensitive, and you are a Vizsla, and you are getting better with using the Force and listening to it, and we can always guide you if you stumble, so you can just… reach out, to the crystal inside the Darksabre. Who knows, it may just be lonely….”

Pre looks a little green, now, but he does stumble away to Elta’s ship, where three-quarters of the things from Whistling Bird 3 – mostly the empty crates and containers – have been stored since Elta became their guardian, including the belongings of half of the clan.

Siri smacks Garen on the shoulder while Pre is away. “You didn’t make it better.”

“I didn’t see you try,” Garen snipes back, and smacks back for good measure.

They would have devolved into at least a smack-fest if not for Pre returning with the sabre, faster than when he went.

And their little spat is forgotten instantly, entirely, when the sabre is lit on Pre’s shaking hand and the clan reach out to the awakened crystal as one.

Chapter Text

The crystal of the Darksabre screams.

The blade is black, traced with darts of white, but the crystal screams, as if bled.

No, not bled, but… something.

No, not the crystal. The crystal is not screaming… right? There is something – someone – else…?

Clan Shriek-Hawk withstands the screaming. Barely.

They stay. They listen. They be.

Then, desperate, one of them – nobody realise who, nobody care who – begins to sing. A very old song taught to Jedi crèchelings and initiates everywhere, everywhen. A simple, pure song praising the Force as giver and unifier of life. A children song, but true nonetheless.

The song catches like wildfire. Words, meaning and projection.

It spreads. It permeates. it strengthens. It soaks.

And, in time, the screaming of the not-crystal mellows into desperate, exhausted, miserable cries for help.

And still, the clan stays, and listens, and be.

`We are here. you are heard. You are not alone.`

After some more while, an enterprising clanmate or three got the idea to project soothing-but-true emotions-thoughts-sensations to the screamer, and let whoever-it-is see them on its leisure, and maybe it would reach back to them?

And it works.

It reaches out, timidly, cautiously, like an animal long abused with no reprieve even promised, let alone in sight. And it shows them.

It is not the crystal, after all. It is a sliver of soul stuffed into the crystal and held there, having been ripped off long ago by vile monsters mascarading as sentient beings, as kin.

Not an imprint. Not an echo. Not part of the crystal, despite the long, forceful cohabitation.

Shock-horror-grief-revulsion is the clan’s first reaction. Not denial. Never denial. Nothing and nobody can dissemble – let alone outright lie – in soul-to-soul communication, after all, as they could to a small degree in mind-to-mind communication if they were very skilled in such.

Empathy-fear-concern-care comes next, when the clan manages to comprehend a little of what has been done to the soul whose sliver they are interacting with.

And then, naturally, they ask-wheedle-beg, `Where is your other part? Tell us? We would like to help reunite you! Don’t you want to be reunited? You can be whole again when you are reunited, right?`

Longing-hope-fear-hesitation is the only answer, for a long while. But the clan waits, more or less patiently, and, at length, images bloom across the link they have accidentally but naturally established with each other.

A neti wearing deep-brown outer Jedi attire that hints broadly at the armour beneath – `Master Saa?!!!` – is linked tightly with a sephi with brown hair and green eyes wearing the same unique clothing combo – `Master Fay?` – and overlain with a strong sense of unity-oneness-sibling-companionship-dependability-protection-fondness-eternity.

`Triad,` the soul-sliver conveys wistfully, then. To most of the clan’s shock. Because dyads are much more common, even before the Ruusan Reformation, compared to triads, and even the existence of the former bond has declined sharply ever since, as it “could lead to a Fall whenever one or the other is hurt severely or falls.”

A parade of four other beings follow, all Mandalorians in armour. Twice over: once helmeted and the other not. One of them is even garbed the same as the Master Saa and Master Fay lookalikes.

`Family. Elders,` the soul-sliver introduces, then. `Blood kin. Soul kin. Heart kin. Protectors. Providers.`

A single image slides in right after, looking like a young and smaller Jedi Master Yoda, Grandmaster of the Jedi Order, clad in a hooded onesie that somehow gleams with the sheen of beskar, and the soul-sliver tags it as: `Child. Heir. Soul kin. Heart kin.`

It is not really what the clan meant, but interesting and rather relevan nevertheless.

Smiling, the oldest of them takes point and clarifies, after the information has been digested and its ramification pursued to a degree. `You are of two parts, now. Where is the part resting in your body?`

There is no guarantee that the body will still be there after this long, nor retrievable. but the soul-sliver believes so, firmly, and the clan sees what it sees, feels what it feels.

And they are willing to act, because something is better than nothing, and they must do their best to help, in any case.

Chapter Text

The biggest argument yet among Clan Shriek-Hawk breaks out after their communion with the soul-sliver inhabiting the Darksabre’s crystal, rivalling the one about finding crystals and building lightsabres for the younger members of the clan.

Some want to fetch the mentioned persons before undertaking anything this risky and dangerous.

Some others would rather be totally undiscovered still, and that means no involving Masters Saa and Fay.

A few argue that those Jedi masters deserve to have their triad sibling back, in whichever way possible.

Many point out that this is a horrible undertaking, anyway, with or without help.

The two eldest in their ranks veto the younger clanmates’ involvement in any related mission they will undertake. Clan members under thirteen will not take any part in the upcoming mission except for needed company after the soul-sliver’s reunion with its main part.

And the aforementioned preteens are not pleased at all about it, naturally.

None think to baulk or wait for years till the youngest among them are much more able to defend themselves, still.

*

While Clan Shriek-Hawk dithers on the distant planet of Sorgan, the Jedi living in the temple on Coruscant undergo a quiet upheaval.

The Force-nexus under the temple has been cleansed. The Sith shrine sitting in it has been demolished entirely, despite its potential as neutraliser for Dark objects. The search for the missing crèchelings has been brought up again.

But missions from the Senate are flooding in more than ever, and the Jedi Order must take them, and this leaves so few defenders and caretakers in the temple to watch and help the infirmed, inexperienced and younglings.

“We have been scrutinised for rejecting so many missions already! We cannot reject more, and we are already stretched out thin at present. The most that we can do is to ask if the Shadows afield are willing to forgo their leave-time to help search for the initiates, but the trail may have gone cold by now,” the High Council explains sadly, tiredly when a few Jedi confront them about the matter.

“I’m a Shadow. I’m willing to search for them,” Jedi Knight Tholme, one of the petitioners and the Watcher who brought Quinlan to the crèche three years ago, pleads.

“I’m a Shadow, too,” Jedi Knight Feemor, newly repudiated by Jedi Master – or Jedi Knight, now? – Qui-Gon Jinn, adds softly. “I’m willing to help search for them. The Force willing, they will be found, and found well. I and my padawan can bond through this mission, and Ace can help me reach out to the younglings.”

“This can be a good mission for me and my padawan, as well,” Jedi Master Cin Drallig puts in. “Seire is training as an investigator. This will be good for them. They are also not much older than the younglings, so they will be able to relate with each other and relax.”

Jedi Knight Mace Windu, who is actually a strong candidate for a seat on the High Council, who also had his sights on Depa as his first padawan, stands back and watches silently.

And, for all that, they get a definite no.

“We need you for other missions,” one councilmember explains, then.

“Perhaps we could spare one of you, but no more,” another adds, albeit rather doubtfully.

“It could be dangerous. Those with padawans are best stationed here,” yet another points out heavily. “We are severely understaffed, at present. We need experienced fighters and caretakers to help keep the temple safe and running.”

“You expect threats,” Tholme half-states, half-asks.

“Our number has been declining, and the Senate sends us to more and more missions? Of course,” a fourth councilmember grumbles.

“Let us evacuate the younglings and infirmed, then,” Cin puts forward. “Coruscant is a big target. We could relocate to Dantooine or some other place for the time being. The search for the missing younglings will be easier from such starting point, as well.”

“In greater danger, the younglings and infirmed will be, and more scrutiny will we be under,” the Grandmaster of the Order shakes his head. “No, safe our missing younglings are, when last I meditated this morning. To our missions we must pay attention to, right now. What will be, the prerogative of the Force it is.”

And, just so, the petition fails.

Not for the first time, at that.

But, this time, a few nondescript starships have already been prepared in advance, large enough to be able to contain a dozen adult humanoid individuals with some discomfort and stocked up for not only the prescribed missions but also more, chiefly Outer-Rim-proof medical and nutritional supplies and child-appealing comforts, and they are ready to go at a moment’s notice.

Tholme has been ordered to spy on the escalating in-fighting among Mandalorians that has spilt far and wide, this time to Korda 6. Mace has been ordered to help Master T’ra Saa – accidentally the master who finished his training to knighthood after his first master’s passing during a solo mission – escort younglings to Ilum to gather their crystals. Cin – a candidate for the position of Battlemaster despite his “extreme youth,” after successfully running the lightsabre classes these two years – is to go to Kuat with his padawan of half a year to investigate the series of sabotage happening on its shipyards these last three months. And, meanwhile, Feemor and his padawan of two days are to stay in temple, sure up their training bond, and help out whenever required.

And they obey the orders. On the surface.

If they take a side mission or two, nobody need to know but themselves and those they are in league with.

Chapter Text

Cin and his padawan are the first to finish their assigned mission, which results in the discovery and exposure of the supposedly unknown sentient forced labour for small-ship-part assembly – just another name for slavery, really, in their opinion – hidden below-deck of certain shipyards. Guided by the results of his careful questioning of his padawan, who possesses the Force-gift of glimpses of visions summoned through questions asked to them, Cin then creates a plan for what they will do next and coordinates with his cohorts both on mission and in temple, including the said padawan.

And then they hastily zip away to Denon and brave a Mandalorian specialty restaurant, to hopefully speak with an “Arla Fett” or a “Farre Vizsla” or a “Farla Vizsla,” or all three of them, who Seire Kari the padawan is certain will be important in… not searching for, per se, but dealing with the younglings once they find the said younglings, somehow.

Cin has no idea whatsoever why Jedi-raised younglings would be more comfortable with unknown Mandalorians instead of with a fellow Jedi-raised child and the lightsabre teacher the older younglings have known these two years. He himself personally knows that most Mandalorians are no danger to younglings of whichever background. But… this….

Well, the Force wills what it wills, in any case. And apparently the Force will guide them all the way to the younglings, too, for Seire has indicated no need for them to find someone to help them search, and Cin’s own meditation is fruitless in that case.

*

Tholme is the next one to… not finish his assigned mission, per se, but at least arrive on planet. He spends much time sneaking round instead of blending in with the populace, seeing that the natives seem to be of just one – non-human – species, rather xenophobic, already in league with Mandalorians that are training them with warfare techs far above what their original standard seems to be, and have a group of humans or near as hostages already. And, from what he has been overhearing, with lots of difficulty given the heat-detecting and heat-seeking capabilities of the Mandalorians’ helmet and weapon techs, the kidnapees are meant to be baits for… another Mandalorian faction?

Tholme ends up pleading to the Force to send him reinforcements of any kind, to the Shadows to send him anyone who can be spared to help gather information and persuade the Kordans from this foolish action, and, via his strongest directed mental projection, to Kordan parents with underaged children to relocate elsewhere to avoid the possible bloodbath that may occur some time soon.

After all, if he cannot help the missing initiates yet, at least he can help other children and their caretakers. And he can hand over the investigation and resolution to the other Jedi once they arrive, therefore freeing him to go after Quinlan and the little brat’s fellow rugrats.

It is just fortunate, really, that Feemor is the one who accepts the communiqué from Tholme. It is also fortunate that, along the way to answer the distress of a fellow Shadow, he happens to pick up Jedi Masters Nico Diath and Knol Ven’nari, who have just been in contact with the ever-elusive Jedi Master Fay.

*

Even compared to Tholme’s extended assignment, Mace and T’ra are still the last to finish their assigned mission. Not only because the distance from Coruscant to Ilum is much greater than to Kuat, Denon or Korda 6, nor because their charges take their time in finding and gathering their crystals. The younglings are simply determined to help their missing fellows in any way, and both adults take it as permission to take a long detour to Dantooine to reopen the temple there.

After all, if Clan Shriek-Hawk and their friends wish not to be separated and need somewhere safe to grow up and learn in their own way, away from the direct attention and meddling of the High Council, they will need a well-secured, well-equipped home.

It helps – immensely – that this idea also appeals greatly to these little helpers.

In fact, they are reopening, repairing and refurbishing many more rooms than are strictly necessary, as well as preparing the grounds outside for various purposes.

Younglings need lots of stimulating places to run round and meditate in, after all, and they are determined to bring not just their missing fellows to live here. This place is much funner than Coruscant is!

It is made even funner when Jedi Master Fay arrives and, together with Master T’ra, tells about the times of their childhood together spent here along with their triad sibling, Tarre Vizsla.

Chapter Text

After so long debating with each other in between their daily routines, and after moving camp twice, Clan Shriek-Hawk finally achieves a more-or-less win-win solution to the matter that is by now dubbed “the Darksabre problem.”

Yes, they will go together, and soon.

No, they will not involve other Mandalorians, since there could be traps specific to Mandalorians, given who might be the bait for it.

No, they will not involve other Jedi, either, since the younglings are still avoiding being returned to Coruscant and kept there till they are padawans or Service Corps members.

No, the nine definitely cannot be active participants in this mission, however capable and mature they are mentally.

Yes, there may be traps for Jedi, too, but this is unavoidable, and Jon is rather experienced in raiding Sith temples by now, since it is what he did to pass his knighthood trials.

Yes, they need to stock up on more medical equipment and supplies as well as easily digestible foods, just in case the body of the soul-sliver that is by now their fast friend is still alive and needs medical support and recovery.

Yes, it means they need to do some “wealth redistribution” again, or at least access the accounts Reeft and Siri set up to house the credits they had drained from select individuals on Brentaal 4, and this necessitates them going to somewhere far from where they wish to camp or even settle in, possibly even the Core.

And, no, they do not need to all go there. In fact, only reeft and Siri and Elta should go, in Elta’s ship, while the others – under Jon’s care – should move to another location and tell the three only when both parties have determined that it is safe to do so on both ends.

It is by no way a good compromise for all involved, let alone a pleasing one, but it is what it is, and they are soon approaching the optimal time to retrieve the body of their friend, anyway, judging by the feeling in the Force when they meditate as a clan, and prolonged debate would only make them overshoot that point.

Still, having no mission to undertake while three of theirs have one is torture to the remaining clanmates. Jon does his best to distract the younglings, the younglings do their best to submit to the distraction, but in the end they talk about sneaking into the Nightbrother village on Dathomir to retrieve Savage, the brother-by-blood Maul never knew he has, and only knows because Obi-Wan revealed it some time ago.

“Savage can’t be too big yet right now,” Obi-Wan muses.

“We got space, though it’ll be tight, even if Savage’s a grown-up,” Kit points out.

“I can take point if we have to deal with the Nightsisters,” Depa offers.

“Maybe we could do something for other Nightbrothers who’d like to leave?” Agen pleads.

“Nothing that will endanger us,” Jon insists. “Master Elta would kill me, otherwise.”

“We need another ship, then?” Garen puts forward hopefully.

“We could drop them on Iridonia,” Agen suggests hesitantly.

Luminara shakes her head. “Nah. They could be tracked easy there. Predictable.”

“Unused Jedi temple?” Tiplar wonders, just as Tiplee says, “Dagobah! I heard it’s a swampy planet, like Dathomir, and the Force is strong there.”

“It’d be like home to them,” Aalto observes smilingly.

“They could always go with us, if there aren’t too many of them,” Bruck shrugs.

“Nuh-uh. Too noticeable,” Quinlan refutes.

“Give them a ship and train them and let them be or follow us?” Pre puts in.

“We can build a fleet and live in it!” Maul exclaims, grinning.

“No, we aren’t pirates,” Bant interjects dryly, but she is grinning, too.

The clanmates look at each other, then, eyes shining. Even Jon, although he is by nature and recent responsibility more reserved than the rest.

And, just so, they are decided:

They are going to Dathomir, with at least a handful of back-up plans and scenarios under their collective figurative belt.

Chapter Text

Reeft and Siri end up buying a medical ship instead of just medical equipment and supplies. Elta is the one who buys it, of course, after the three of them have meditated to see where and how they can acquire such a vessel discretely and inspected the choices shown to them. The bonus is: Looking typically Mando as they are, nobody thinks it weird when Elta then modifies the ship to be much better armed and armoured, nor when the two younglings tailing after them suggest salient points to look at and address, protection-wise. Mandos are Mandos are Mandos, after all. It makes sense that they arm and armour even their medship as if it were a warship… or maybe the medship is in fact meant to join in a war somewhere! And their poor, poor, poor little ones have no choice but to join in, too. Damn war-mongering Mandos.

The medship – with the much smaller ship stored inside – flies away uncontested, because of that. The space control personnel takes a note of its jump vector, true, but it is only to prevent the nosies and busybodies from tailing after it, really. After all, nobody would like to be embroiled in a Mando war in the calibre that would necessitate a mobile hospital, right?

Well, fortunately for the three crewing the medship for now, and unfortunately for possible tails, they do not take a straight path back to the Outer Rim.

They stock up for other things than just medical supplies, too. The clan’s miscellaneous supplies are running dry, after all.

And whoever try to prey on the medship regret it. Three separate pirate groups, case in point.

The crew even got to save a Force-sensitive baby zabrak – well, toddler, really, but whatever – from their last assailants. And the baby, from the lingering memory of… her?… earliest moments that the crew manage to tease out and see, is named Asajj Ventress by her mother, before the said mother lost her to a kidnapping pirate during a moment of inattention.

“Obi-Wan said something about Ventress,” Siri offers uneasily after the figurative bomb has fallen properly on them.

“He said things,” Reeft snorts, unimpressed. “He kept flirting with the enemies. And she flirted back.”

A choked-up trill of startled laughter is forced out of Elta, and her cradling hold on a dozing Asajj tightens.

“Really,” Reeft insists. “S’not just me who thinks he’s crazy, too! Everyone think he’s crazy.”

“Well,” Siri dithers. “Got to say, though, that lets him fish out intel, too, more often than not.”

Reeft snorts again. “Cause they’re frustrated with him,” he points out, then falls into reluctant snickering.

Siri joins him for a little while, then sobers up again with a sigh and visibly gears herself up to say, with her attention fully on her two clanmates on-board, “The point is, Obi-Wan said that Ventress got a master, once. A Jedi master. On Rattatak. And the Jedi was already stranded there when she arrived.”

“Possibly with our pirates,” Reeft continues, understanding dawning on his face, in his voice, and in his Force-presence. “We’re close to Rattatak.”

“Shall we fetch the Jedi, then?” Elta swims with the flow, used to the clan’s way of operating by now and no longer so bothered about little children speaking like adults when a certain mood strikes them.

“We don’t know how he might react to us, or Ventress, or you,” Siri points out, revealing the source of her unease. “Is he going to report us to the High Council? Is he going to freak out and be a bother? Is he going to try to take over our mission? Is he going to get along well with everyone? And will everyone be mad at us for this?”

Elta shrugs. “We can always check,” they say. “Or rather, I can, and you stay here with Asajj. More defenders – adult defenders – and strength, for later. It is good, easier for us, safer.”

Siri and Reeft exchange looks.

But, in the end, they capitulate.

*

“Old” as he was when he was brought to the Coruscant temple by Ba’ji T’ra, Cin still remembers his family, his roots, his language, his first adoptive culture. His padawan is a delight, too, and has agreed to pose as parent and child for the duration of this mission.

He suspects that Seire would agree to make it permanent, too, but he would rather not have the High Council’s attention and ire rained on the two of them for it until Seire is far older and more able to withstand such barrage, also until the child is really sure about it.

In any case, infiltrating the Mandalorian specialty restaurant was far easier, armed with such advantages.

Extricating themselves after they met with Arla Fett and Farre Vizsla – who turned out to be a umongous, Ka’ra-channelling armourer and their equally Ka’ra-channelling artist spouse, respectively – is proving to be far harder. Living rather secluded as he was with his first adoptive family, he was never aware that Mandalorians could be so social, so chatty. And with how Seire lapped up all the attention showered on them….

Well, he is lucky that Armourer Arla and their spouse have just agreed to go with the two of them to help the missing children without too many questions and stipulations, also that the spouses have called for just one reinforcement by the name of Farla Vizsla, who is apparently their child instead of just a clan member as Cin previously assumed when Seire firstly told him on Kuat, whom they need to fetch from Concord Dawn. But he feels even more lucky that, after days being the subject of avid attention of Mandalorian strangers, he finally has the reason to leave without hurting anyone’s feelings or having them tag along in the mission.

Not that he did not enjoy these few days in certain aspects – far from it! He just doesn’t need Mandalorian-shaped complications – or any kind of complications, for that matter – right now!

The missing younglings take precedence.

After that, if there is time and Seire agrees to abscond here… well….

Chapter Text

When the medship – named Reunion by the three original crew who think of going on relief and slave-freeing missions with this upon the conclusion of their original mission – meets up with Whistling Bird 3 on orbit of Dathomir, there are not only four occupants aboard the customised cruiser, or even five, but seven.

A Jedi who gave the crew no definite name – “Some people simply call me Dark Woman.” – approached them on their last fuel stop before Dathomir, trailed by a small Force-sensitive child she claimed as her padawan, and told them that she was going to be needed in their upcoming mission, whatever it would be. She knew by herself that it would involve Sith-soaked traps and beasts and terrain, and she was willing to take point in springing the traps and facing the “chrysalides” that may be waiting for them on their way to retrieving the soul-sliver’s body, and it is the only reason the crew agreed to take her and her tiny padawan along.

When they see how Jon – suddenly tightly shielded in the Force, like during their first meeting and days with him – refuses to come out of Whistling Bird 3 and just lets the others come out alone, though, they begin to regret the decision. This is so not Jon, and “Dark Woman” is somehow the reason for it.

The three medship crewmembers apologise in person when “Dark Woman” is busy with her little student, Aurra Sing. Then they explain the story, their reasons, and apologise again.

And Jon is floored. He is baffled, and flustered, and uncertain, and that just makes the crew feel more horrible.

“Who’s she to you?” Siri tentatively asks after a span of awkward silence between the four of them.

Jon does not answer for a long time, and the crew are beginning to think he will not answer when he at last mutters towards the hands he has twisted on his crossed legs, “She raised and taught me.”

It does not answer anything. But, at the same time, it does.

Jon never talked about his padawan years, or where he came from before that, or what he did after that. He never took to training those far younger than he is, too, especially those who are “real” children, namely Pre and Maul, even after all this while. He is far more comfortable being a guard or an advisor than a teacher.

And now….

“Tell me, Jon,” Elta begins, her voice smooth but hard like polished beskar, “is Aurra safe with her?”

“Dark Woman said Aurra’s her new padawan,” Siri supplies.

“She’s with the kid, now,” Reeft finishes.

And Jon flinches.

“Shab,“ Elta mutters to themself, cursing, and buries the visor of their helmet in their gloved hands. “Shab, shab, shab, shab.”

“Can you… cope, just for a little while? Just until this mission is finished?” Siri, hunching over in shame and worry, asks in a small, timid voice, meanwhile, with her eyes firmly on the crate she is seated on. “We could keep you company here, or others, so you don’t have to see her, and you don’t have to shield much, too, and we’ll confront her about Aurra after the mission, too.”

And, “How’s Dathomir? What did you all do? Why’s there two more zabraks with you?” Reeft bluntly tries to redirect their conversation to safer areas.

And Jon pounces on the latter, figuratively, telling them in his short, awkward way about the rest of the clan’s plan to retrieve Maul’s brother Savage and perhaps other Nightbrothers, about the previously unknown presence of the other brother named Feral, about the other Nightbrothers either too loyal to the Nightsisters or to their traditions or to the other Nightbrothers to leave, about their plan of reopening and settling in the abandoned Jedi temple on Dantooine by themselves after this mission….

They talk, they bounce ideas around, and everything feels almost like before.

Almost.

*

For one blessed by the Force in the field of element manipulation, particularly fire and fire-related, Knol ven’nari has been having a blast in this mission, literally and figuratively.

She didn’t think much when poor, dear Fee plus his cute, not-so-little padawan caught up to her and Nico before they could meander away to their next mission, some time ago. He said dear Tholme was in trouble with Mandos of the not-so-good kind, and she likes Tholme, and the Force nudged her there, so she went. Nico, as well. And since then she gets to play: jamming flamethrowers and blasters and thermal detonators, diverting heat away from herself and her companions to fool the heat-seekers and heat-detectors while they’re together, everything.

All in the name of sabotaging the group of Mandos ominously named Death Watch and keeping the Kordans save and away from their violent politicking.

Also anonymously freeing the personnel of the Kordan Defence Force who were meant to be bait for another group of Mandos the Death Watchers call… what?… the Cowards? Well, anyway, that.

Nico is currently busy grounding and defanging the last Mandos’ ships with her, which got drawn here from… elsewhere… though she heard the name Concordia a few times… to replace and/or resupply those the two already sabotaged before. And, just like before, she’s the one to conceal their body heat while Nico buoys them and bends light away from them to fool both natural and digital eyes, also possible pressure plates. In the meantime, also just as per usual, Fee and his padawan befriend the locals alongside Tholme, following Tholme’s earlier sellf-assigned role, and slowly but surely introduce the idea for the locals to stay away from the Mandos: the outsiders who look down on them, the trainers who don’t want to train with them, the so-called saviours who don’t give them other venues to better themselves but with violence, and it’s all true.

Both groups have gathering information as their side mission. But she still thinks her job is the best.

Everything dealing with fire is great, after all, starting from saving innocents from literal and figurative fires to putting the guilty on – for now – the figurative fire.

Oh, she will have many stories to tell Fay and poor Jon later. Pity Fay is currently on remote, abandoned Dantooine, and Jon is… wherever he is.

She has the nagging feeling that they will meet again soon, though, so she looks forward to it. Oh, she does.

Chapter Text

After further, various, painstaking round of arguments and compromises, during which Jon reluctantly involved himself and therefore exposed himself to his former master and his padawan sister, it has been decided that they will all go to Dantooine and set up a rudimentary living space there, that Ky Narec – the formerly stranded Jedi knight – will take care of all the children while continuing to revive the Jedi temple there, and that Whistling Bird 3 will be left there only for emergencies. Reunion will then leave again with Elta, Dark Woman and Jon aboard, and it will hang in orbit of whichever planet the Darksabre’s inhabitant points to, operated by the astromechs that came with it, with at least four of the 2-1Bs that also came with it ready in one of the emergency rooms near one of the hangars to treat each of the mission conductors and – hopefully! – the person they come for. And Elta will ferry the two Jedi with their own ship to the planet’s surface and hover nearby, ready for either air support or speedy extraction or both – most likely both.

When they arrive on Dantooine, though, everything changes.

“What – the temple was abandoned, last I went here!” Dark Woman splutters, the first time anyone sees her lose her poise, as Reunion goes into a gentle landing on the apparently newly bared grounds in front of the not-so-derelict, squat, sturdy building that is the main Jedi temple on planet. A few children in Jedi robes are standing on the open front doors of the temple, and one soon vanishes back into it, most likely to tell the other inhabitants in person.

The others, also gathered on the bridge to have their own first sights of the temple, are too busy doing their own spluttering to note – let alone comment – about this anomaly, however.

“Younglings?” Elta demands, slipping back into Mando’a, as they otherwise rarely do when in non-Mando’a-speaking company. “Where are their guardians?”

“That’s Master Windu!” Depa squeaks when, just so, a bald human adult clad similarly in Jedi robes hurries out of the doors.

“That’s one of the people Té mentioned about.” Bruck points at the neti hurrying behind him, referring to the name – or nickname? – of the soul-sliver they are undertaking the mission for, which they got after a few intense communion sessions with the Darksabre’s crystal.

“Huh. Two of them,” Aalto observes, nodding at the long-haired adult human coming out last. “Just four more, and it’ll be complete.”

“Who is Té?” Dark Woman joins in, apparently having regained control of her own mind and bearing.

“Our friend,” is what Pre yells as he dashes towards one of the two main boarding ramps, followed closely by the other children, “real children” or not, newly friends or not.

In fact, with a terse parting nod, Elta and Jon soon follow, leaving Ky and Dark Woman alone with each other.

And, socially awkward as Ky is, especially when in the company of a severe personality such as Dark Woman, he soon invites her to follow the mob towards the entrance of the ship just so that they have something to talk about, and eagerly excuses himself to do just that when she demurs.

He sensibly hangs back, though, when he reunites with most of the other non-droid occupants of the ship, as what is happening just beyond the ramp of the ship is… chaotic.

The other adults are talking with each other on one side, looking every so often at the younger generation spread nearby, and Jon is trying valiantly to coralle the ship’s inhabitants while they meet or reunite with fellow younglings who apparently recently went on a Gathering mission.

An admirable effort, that, but to no avail, as Ky has predicted.

And he will be in charge of them soon, if any part of their plan will still be executed.

`Oh, Force.`

*

Cin never forgets his parent, blurred though the memory has been by a child’s mind, distance in time and space, and trauma.

Well, apparently, his parent never forgets him, to. And the said parent is here, on Dantooine. Because, the moment he, Seire and the trio of humongous Mandalorians touch down on Dantooine in the Mando family’s even-more-humongous ancient Mandalorian ship, the moment the boarding ramp is down, the moment they extend their presences out – he never even detected that the trio are Force-users, to be able to do this, and reflexively, at that! – to the gathering happening on the grounds of the startlingly not-abandoned temple, E’bu’s presence is one of those that welcome them.

And then E’bu homes in on him, and they streak towards him, and he streaks towards them, and they swoop him up and round and round and…. Well, suffice to say, it is not a good example of a well-comported Jedi knight for Seire.

And then Seire ever so politely demands the same treatment once Cin, newly returned to his feet, introduces both to each other.

And E’bu obliges most heartily, to the ten-year-old’s utter delight.

And then the two bond with each other over being Mandalorian Jedi, and Seire is now excited about being his child in truth, not just his student, and… well, Cin would rather let the grandparent and grandchild be, for now, really, and return only when the excitement has died down some.

Never be said that Cin’dralyc Eldar is ignorant of when it is time to do a strategic retreat.

It helps that he brought guests in the form of the trio of Mandalorians that he is yet to introduce to the others, and he is yet to investigate how and why this temple was reopened, and he needs to help teach the missing younglings better about haring off without even telling anyone, and perhaps a few other things.

It will occupy him nicely for some time, yes.

Chapter Text

The plan for Té’s rescue changes.

There is new intel, from Té’s triad siblings, so the plan changes.

And Clan Shriek-Hawk unexpectedly finds out that “Té” is indeed a nickname.

Of Tarre Vizsla.

Otherwise Taré Ýosaré-childe. But, still, Tarre Vizsla.

It is… hard, to reconcile the general image of a powerful warrior and a skillful Jedi master and a beloved ruler of Mandalorian Space with the lonely, formerly screaming, desperate-for-positive-company, cuddly-in-the-Force, loving, curious, witty, more-often-playful-than-not, solicitous, warm soul-sliver the clanmates have been close friends with these few weeks.

Té the soul-sliver even managed to win over Maul and Jon after just a brief acquaintance, and both are the most reticent and suspicious members of the clan to date.

Té the soul-sliver felt – feels – old but young, too, similar to the time-travellers but… not.

In fact, during their mission to gather medical equipment and supplies, Elta, Reeft and Siri also prepared clothes and all that would fit a teenager, for Té, with Jon’s measurements as a rough barometer.

Unsurprisingly, these new facts are hardest to be accepted by Pre, whose entire clan prior to his induction into Clan Shriek-Hawk idolise Tarre Vizsla and the Darksabre. Especially when Bruck points out that the betrayers that saw Té’s – Tarre’s? – soul torn into two must have been Vizslas, judging by Té’s own admission of kin to them, early on.

“What they did, it is not at all your fault, little one.” Master T’ra tries to soothe Pre, and an awkward and guilty Bruck likewise.

But none of them succeed, and Pre spends the time babbling miserable, frightened, grovelling apologies to “Master Tarre,” otherwise “Mand’alor,” otherwise “Alor Vizsla,” instead of playing and training and meditating with the others.

Instead of doing the same with Té, too, like the clan often did when quiet time was to be had, which in turn makes Té miserable, and that just sends Pre into new heights of tearful anxiety.

And that makes Té fall into tearful anxiety, as well.

It is a vicious circle, which is broken only when three of the four other beings Té marked as their closest family arrive on Dantooine alongside Cin and his padawan Seire Kari.

Two of the beings approach Pre and the crystal-bound Té, who are huddled in the small but flourishing berry-bush garden to the side of the temple, offer a soft greeting to Pre both verbally and in the Force, and offer the same to Té, who replies with a grateful, desperate cuddle as well as babbles of… not just greetings.

When Té is feeling better, the two newcomers tell Pre about Té’s funniest shenanigans as a baby, and a little child, and even in-between being a young leader to their people, and Pre is too busy laughing to feel guilty or miserable, and Té is too busy being relieved to complain – not too much, in any case.

“Té loves you, little one,” Farre Vizsla, Té’s eldest sibling, murmurs to Pre, at the end, as the four of them make their way into the temple, with Pre riding in the gigantic older Mandalorian’s arms.

Farla Vizsla, Ba’vodu Farre’s child that is two heads shorter than their parent, who is nonetheless much older than Té, who is holding Té’s crystal at present, snorts agreeingly. “You would know, if they were mad at you,” they recall with fond exasperation.

Then they demonstrate it, by bouncing Té’s crystal gently while singing the song that they claim Té used to despise the most, which turns out to still be so, because Té wails sulkily and grumpily tries to trip Ba’vod’ad Farla with a select application of the Force.

Pre’s laughter rings along the halls they are traversing, attracting immediate and much attention given how despondent he has been thus far, and others soon join in the merriment, after he explains everything to them in-between sputters of giggles.

Nothing is said about Pre’s freak-out. Nothing is thought or said about their changed plan to retrieve Té’s body, either, at least for a while.

They wish to enjoy themselves, to boulster themselves against the looming unpleasantness, and they have it.

Chapter Text

The rescue plan now involves most of the younglings of Clan Shriek-Hawk, although no other younglings, to the said other younglings’ vocal displeasure and their assigned masters’ – Mace and Cin and Ky’s – relief. It is only because these sixteen, alongside Jon and Elta, have bonded themselves fast with the crystal-bound Té, which should help when – Force-willing – it is time for Té’s sundered soul to reclaim each other.

Dark Woman attempts to bring Aurra along, arguing that the latter is also a youngling and her student to boot, but Fay – her former teacher, it turns out – stomps on the notion down hard.

“Return alive and well, and you might be able to see the child to her knighthood,” the incensed, agrieved, pained sephi says. “I am not pleased with how you raised Jon, but I did not know about it before. No more, child. No more. You are a good Jedi, I know that. You do good for the galaxy, and you are a credit to the Order, but you should consider doing good for the children entrusted to you, as well.”

“Just place her in the medical ship with the other children!” It is practically unheard-of that one as poised and severe as the woman who long forsook her given name of An’ya Kuro could lose her composure like this. But then again, Fey taught her and raised her, gained and still holds her respect, and she is finding how hard it is to face the sorrow and disappointment of one’s respected mentor and pseudo-parent aimed right at her. They are alone in the garden nook Pre and Té used to inhabit not long ago, too, while others are busy preparing for departure or checking if everything is fine or stocked up well, and this just makes it harder to control herself.

Not to mention, something bittersweet has been looming in the Force in regard to this mission, all possibilities possessing such mixture in almost equal measure, and she does not wish for this dialogue, this bargain, this plea to be part of the bitter.

It is a sliver of humanity she allows herself so rarely. And, by the Force, she will see it done.

*

On another part of the temple, namely the newly cleared landing pad that now houses Reunion, another debate occurs under one of the exhaust ports of the medship, this time between Elta and their long-lost, long-thought-dead first child, now going by the name – formerly nickname – Cin’dralyc… which is somehow spelt “Cin Drallig” by the Coreworlders putting him into the Jedi Order’s database.

This time, it is about Cin’s assertion of the lack of enough ground fighters to be deployed on whichever planet the mission will bring Reunion’s updated crew to.

“Two are not enough, and the second one is even still a child. Please, E’bu.” Cin returns to the same argument, after going on four rounds of the debate with his equally exasperated, equally worried parent. But nobody ever lauds him for his skills in diplomacy, anyway, and this is too important, even if they were not retrieving a probably-semi-alive Tarre Vizsla, which they are.

“Ad’ika….” Elta sighs, slumps, gathers him into a tired but heart-felt embrace, and lays the forehead of their visor on his own bare forehead, creating a smooth, firm, cool contact point that he can feel the both of them focus on. This is the most they ever speak in a very long time, he can feel it, too, but they are not about to give up the fight, either.

And then, still without releasing him, still with their forehead on his, Elta continues but in a different vane from before, admitting, “If you were not raising a child of your own, my grandchild, I might have recommended you, after testing you thoroughly, however much my heart would scream against it. But you do have Seire, and they need you. Té would have been heart-broken if you were injured or more during this mission and they found out after the fact, too, and they would not have been the only one.”

They firm the contact between their foreheads, admonishingly, then adds, “And, before you say it, no, you cannot just switch Seire’s care to another, Cin’ika. Think on how traumatising it would be, for your bond to be severed while there could have been another way. I cannot prevent Dark Woman from going on this mission, since she inserted herself into my crew for this very reason when we stocked up, but – no, just no.”

“We are Jedi, E’bu,” Cin grumps tiredly, retreading an argument that he has put forward four times before. “Seire knows what the risks are.”

“And if Se’ika chooses to circumvent your authority on them, and sneak aboard my ship with you for the retrieval? Or do something else so you cannot come and they do, just so you are safe?”

Cin stiffens.

Elta hugs him tighter.

“They are your child, Cin’ika. Do you expect less of them?”

Cin slumps.

`Damn it.`

Chapter Text

Seire helps refine the rescue plan by way of their question-triggered divining gift but does not go with the crew.

Neither does Cin.

Aurra stays, too.

Both children are tasked to take care of Asajj and Feral, who are roughly of age with each other and turning into fast friends, and they are in turn watched closely and taught by Cin and Mace, as Ky takes over the education and entertainment of the other younglings.

Reunion sends them periodical check-ins, and Seire willingly answers some more divining questions as the plan is adjusted again, this time because the planet Reunion is travelling to turns out to be near Serenno, and Master Yan Dooku happens to be visiting his birth family there and wishes to be in the rescue team.

*

Jedi Master Yan Dooku has been a Watcher for some time, specifically since his not-so-ideal parting with his second student Qui-Gon Jinn during the latter’s knighting. And then, during his latest mandatory downtime at the Coruscant temple, he was bidden by his ever-meddling former master to watch the annual initiate tournament and, there, encountered a clever duellist of an initiate by the name of Komari Vosa, whom Master Yoda would like him to take as his third padawan.

She has the typical characteristics Yan favoured in his previous padawans, Master Yoda observed-prodded-cajoled. And, yes, he could not deny that. But still, though he does not have his good friend Sifo-Dyas’ ‘gift’ for foresight – and how glad he is! – something held him back from agreeing immediately to the match.

He fled to serenno when Master Yoda’s cajoling became pestering, in fact. The timing was fortuitous, as well. His birth father had just died. His birth brother was much more easily ignored or evaded, and then the said brother foolishly partook in a lowly but fatal bar brawl. And his sister – his elder sister, to be exact – was lovely.

And Jenza his sister has proven to be a balm for his troubles, indeed, even though he cannot tell her the exact matters that he has been dealing with poorly.

Matters, because Initiate Vosa is not the only matter he has been trying to solve or at least detangle.

The Darkening of the lowest levels of the Coruscant temple holds primary occupation in his mind, in fact, followed closely by – or perhaps at a level with? – the yet-unsolved case of missing younglings. And how Qui-Gon repudiated not only his young Fallen padawan but also his successful first padawan – now Knight Feemor, with a padawan of his own, no less – is a close second.

Matters pertaining to the Dark have always held his attention and morbid fascination, although many have cautioned him through the years. Given that nobody ever noticed how the Dark crouched below, waiting, and how easier it felt to meditate in temple after the cleansing, and when this finding was coupled with missing younglings….

Well, suffice to say, he is happy to be away from Coruscant at present. Less temptation to dig further into what might have caused the Darkening, this way.

Less wallowing in what he may have done wrong – very wrong – with Qui-Gon, too. Serenno is too beautiful and too new to him to let him wallow on anything else but the beauty of his homeworld.

And, now, Serenno’s space control has just informed the royal family that there is an incongruously well-armed medical ship requesting docking for refuelling and restocking on planet, and the Force stirs round the information.

Yan hurries to the space control. And, given how Jenza has snuck his name back into the succession line without their brother’s knowledge recently, his permission for the medical ship to land is given priority and immediately patched through.

The Force, after the initial stirring, only has positive anticipation regarding this anomaly, after all, so why not?

And how glad he is of it when he personally comes to the ship and sees the missing little ones aboard! A handful of Mandalorians are also there, but his years as a Watcher in the Outer Rim have taught him a little better about the Mandalorians and their values, including how protective they are purported to be of their children or those they deem under their protection, which they show now by hovering close to the little ones, and this explains the protections the medical ship possess, as well.

Some of the younglings act wary round him, even perturbed, but, well, this is not new, too, unfortunately. He is just happy that they look well-fed and well-dressed – by commoner’s standard, and not in Jedi garb at that, but this is understandable, even well-thought-of given where they must have been roaming – and that they seem to have the Mandalorians as staunch protectors instead of captors.

The Mandalorians themselves are friendly, too. In a reserved way, but Yan is not a bubbly person, either, and this is far better than fighting each other merely because of their ancient enmity.

And then one of the younglings by the name of Pre – not one that went missing from the crèches at the temple, this one – bravely claims that “Té” is intrigued about him, and wants to meet him, and, “Would Baji Dooku like to meet Té? Té was lonely and hurt. Perhaps Baji Dooku can help?”

The little one is… sweet, and not disgustingly or bafflingly so. Yan is taken aback by his own assessment. Children – or even young knights – do not mix well with him, usually.

So he agrees. Even if “Té” is most likely a pet or even a doll.

But, no, “Té” turns out to be a kyber crystal. Deep Black with sparse, rather jagged, striated white. Larger than the norm for lightsabre cores and rather elongated. And much more sentient than nothing but the oldest and most powerful adegan crystals Yan has ever had the chance and honour to meet in all his life.

It is sapient, in fact, Yan finds, when he gingerly accepts the crystal from Pre and reaches out mentally to it.

And the story it – they – tells….

Well, suffice to say, Yan is now part of the mission to retrieve the body and half a soul of the incongruously young Jedi knight – or master? – trapped in the crystal, whether the other mission conductors would like it or not.

This is far better, far more actionable than wondering about the Dark or how he went wrong with raising and teaching Qui-Gon.

Far more wholesome, too. And Jenza the critic even agrees with him.

Chapter Text

The planet Ettr’k is abandoned. Has been abandoned for a thousand years, it seems. At least by sentients. And it is soaked in the Dark. And populated by twisted, dangerous plantlife and chrysalides – lots of chrysalides – amidst the barren surface.

Especially round the mouth of the tunnel that Té the crystal has indicated where their other half is stored in.

And there are Sith traps along the way, in addition to the chrysalides and the very unfriendly feel of the Force, centred round the tunnel.

Elta and T’ra distract the chrysalides with the armament on Cin’e and Whistling Bird 3 – Elta’s and T’ra’s ships, respectively, the latter fact of which surprised the runaway younglings and made them feel guilty and apprehensive of possible punishments for a while. Fay hangs back and distracts the chrysalides farther away with her own ship, Whistling Bird 2, alongside Farla in Té’s ship, Whistling Bird 1, both having been drawn out of storage and dusted off, though neither were willing to say where the storage was. The two rings of fire prevent the chrysalides from harassing Dark Woman and Jon and Yan too much while they dismantle the Sith traps as quickly but as well as they can. Farre sticks close to the three on the ground, directing the trio to the places the traps are lying in wait, more sensitive to those as they are, having lived through two Sith wars. They also relay the direction of where Té’s body is, while the crystal-bound half is resting securely in one of the pouches on their belt.

Arla, Farre’s spouse and Farla’s other parent, leads the younglings hanging on orbit aboard Reunion in centring themselves in the Force and pooling on their Light, sending it right along to the combatants below as if a beam of light through the darkness indeed. They are also in charge of moving Reunion as needed, looking out for possible dangers aimed at the medship or the on-going mission below from the space round the planet, and preparing for the end of the mission.

And the end comes, indeed, although not quite within the range of expectations of all the mission planners and conductors.

Nobody is dead, although both Dark Woman and Yan are in critical conditions, and the former will have to live with no limbs as well as shortened intestines. But the lack of fatalities itself is great, and these two are safely stored in the stasis medpods aboard Fey’s ship along with the piloting healer, anyway.

The body of Tarre Vizsla – still fully armoured, still fully kitted but for their lightsabre, somehow still alive, and looking untouched by time – has been retrieved successfully, as well. It is not much of an improvement, however, truthfully, since they had been on the verge of collapse already from trying to unify and maintain the unity of a fractious people for so long with little to no rest, even before they got kidnapped and torn into two and imprisoned for a millennium. The merging of the two soul-slivers takes much more time and patience than even the healing of their body, but it is why the clan’s younglings who already bonded themselves to the crystal-bound part are all here and enthusiastically, tenaciously, faithfully coaxing both to trust each other to be one again.

But poor Té is apparently not the only one kidnapped by the Sith remnants and betraying Vizslas, or at least not the only one that ended up imprisoned in the tunnel with them.

Chapter Text

Ba’vodu Farre found their long-missing parent in the tunnel alongside the body of their youngest sibling.

Or rather, they found the ashes of their parent. Which, according to them, must have resulted from activating a death-ward or a death-curse on something or someone or a few of those. And this could be verified only from an expert in such. Which lives a “realm” away, and they do not mean it a planet, or even a galaxy. So Farre took the ashes with them.

But then they accidentally spilt it on a Sith artefact near the mouth of the tunnel. Because they were dodging a chrysalide while holding Té’s limp, fully armoured body.

And the Sith artefact activated.

And a human woman geared as if for a long cross-country march into remote places – huge carrier pack, full pouch belt complete with a canteen of probably water, thigh packs, vest with pockets, sturdy attire and even an unknown gun and pistol and a long hunting knife – is drawn out of it, confused but fighting. And the pertinent persons – Ba’vodu Farre, Ba’vodu Arla, Ba’vodu Farla and the still-crystal-bound Té, that is – agree that she is the said parent, reincarnated.

`Guess what happened to us isn’t that weird, after all?` Obi-Wan comments as he, Quinlan and Garen – a proper triad, now, just like Masters T’ra, Fay and Tarre – huddle round the vent grating over the room now occupied by the said woman, who is still confused and wary and upset but also a little accepting of how she came to be here by this point, three rotations after the mission. They have been trying to get close to her during their downtimes, but Ba’vodu Farre keeps pushing them back and asking them not to – “They would need some time and space alone, little ones. Not even I would bother them, right now, and I am their child.” – but Ba’vodu Farre and their little family are trying a new possible solution to make Té whole again, so now is the trio’s chance. Only, they would have been caught after the fact if they took the route through the corridors of the ship that is now en route back to Dantooine.

Besides, even Obi-Wan has to admit that this is much funner. If rather unethical.

`You think we’re gonna go to that ‘realm’ Ba’vodu talked about?` Garen is awefully excited, wriggling in place and grinning, though there is barely enough space for all three of them on the vent piping.

`Can’t the mum, say, retrieve her previous memories, if she’s indeed a reincarnation, and just tell them?` Quinlan gives the other two a shrug in the Force, because he can’t do it in truth, as squished together as the three of them are. `Besides, did you even get their explanation about what a ‘realm’ is? I didn’t. It’s so confusing, and we’re sorta used to weirdnesses of the Force.`

`Not really,` the other two admit.

`Maybe another plane of existence?` Obi-Wan ventures out.

`But Ba’vodu didn’t seem to mean it as death of any kind,` Garen refutes.

`Well–.`

But whatever Quinlan is about to say is swallowed back with alarm when the woman in the room below suddenly lays herself on the bed that lies parallel to the vent grating, turns to the side facing it in a way that it would be easy to jump up and defend herself, and looks warily, cautiously up straight at it, with her hunting knife unsheathed and waiting in her hand.

`Oh. Oops,` the trio chorus, and do their best to shimmy backwards out of view.

Out of direct launching of the knife, too, despite the fact that this kind of knife is not usually for throwing.

`She isn’t Force-sensitive… is she?` Garen frets bemusedly.

`Well, we’re karked, either way,` Quinlan snorts.

`Not if we got clear soon and got an alibi?` Obi-Wan offers nervously.

`It took us ages to get here from our room, Obi,` Garen grumbles. `How’d we set up the alibi before she could catch or report us?`

`Um, she’s not the type to report anything?` Obi-Wan ventures out. `And she can’t speak any language we know, last I heard.`

`She can do it another way,` Quinlan refutes. `Language isn’t just words or signs, and some people can learn quick if properly motivated.`

`But–.`

This time it is Obi-Wan that gets cut off by circumstance, because there is a knock on the room just beyond them, on their former post on the vent grating, and Ba’vodu Farre’s modulated voice wafts echoingly through the piping.

The trio look at each other in the Force, agree, then return to the post they have just abandoned.

And, through the vent grating, they see a tiny little child with huge blue eyes and black wavy hair perched in Té’s eldest sibling’s armoured arm.

And the said little one feels like Té in the Force.

Chapter Text

The mystery of the woman drawn out of the Sith artefact and a kiddy Té is drowned out by the commcall that Reunion gets from Dantooine while the crew – under Jenza Dooku’s politely insistent demand – take a planetside rest on Serenno for at least a while, or until Yan and Dark Woman have recovered enough to travel with minimal discomfort. The astromechs left on-board with orders to let nobody but the crew in and to patch communications to the wing Jenza has set aside for them do as they have been ordered. They even manage to make it an untraceable holocall with some quality, and the crew, having politely shooed Jenza out for a while and unsuccessfully ousted the younger members from their seats in the sitting room, sit facing a weirdly expressioned Mace and Cin, limmed in the blueish light of hologram.

And, “Coruscant called,” Mace speaks without preamble.

“They want us back,” Cin continues, grimacing. “Apparently Tholme isn’t back yet, either, and the Senate is demanding news about his mission.”

Mace’s lips twitch, as if undecided of being a frown or a smile. “The Council was… displeased,” he picks his words deliberately, it seems. “Tholme got Feemor and Averross to follow after him. Urgent need for help, apparently.”

“Feemor has a student,” T’ra speaks up, worried and a little tense. Mace nods.

“Apparently not a dangerous mission,” he offers. And, yes, it is definitely a tiny smile on his otherwise stern countenance. T’ra is not the only one that relaxes a little.

“They can relocate to Dantooine after the mission if they wish it, then,” T’ra shrugs. “The temple on Coruscant was never meant to hold the crèches.”

“We can reopen the one on Kashyyyk,” Farla, who once made themself a Jedi crèche assistant just so that they could continue looking after and looking out for their kih’ba’vodu Tarre, suggests. “Smuggle the crèches on Coruscant there after that. Or at least remove them to Corellia. The temple there is supposedly able to withstand orbital bombardment.”

Cin chuckles, although it sounds strained and half-harted. And, of course, it attracts attention.

“Cin’ika?” Elta sits up.

“Cin?” T’ra leans forward.

“Master Yoda berated me.” The blond-haired human looks chagrined, now, and sour, and also a little pained. “Dereliction of duty and all.”

“Did you ask others to teach your classes?” Elta cocks their head.

“Did you say you might be a while?” they continue when he nods.

“Did you think of abandoning your chosen student somewhere while you are not there?” they persist when he nods again, now looking rather torn.

“It is not deriliction of duty, then.” The togruta offers him a shrug. “Not so much, in any case. And if we could smuggle the crèches somewhere else, it would not be, because you would be teaching them again.”

The children giggle. Cin’s chuckle is much flatter.

“We will be back on Dantooine soon enough,” Elta tries to soothe him, still. “We can talk more in depth, then, and decide what we need to do next.”

“We should go to Korda Six,” Obi-Wan pipes in, then, and the attention of the room – including the ones on the comm – snaps to him.

He shrinks back, and even more when Mace slowly asks, “How did you know of that planet, youngling?”

Neither the High Council nor anyone else but Elta and Jon and Pre and Maul ever know that nine of the formerly missing younglings are time-travellers, and the cautious part of them would like this state to remain for a while yet – perhaps even forever – for a few reasons, chief of which are the fact that these are not clan and that these adults will likely not believe them anyway.

Although, with the woman and the tiny Té as tangible proof, maybe time travel is no longer a concept too outlandish to consider as truth?

And then, Force bless Obi-Wan, Maul speaks up, defiantly, though he trembles from head to foot, “Vision. Obi got visions.”

It is certainly a safer option, and a true one, from a certain point of view.

And the adults believe it.

Chapter Text

Reunion returns to Dantooine, sans Yan and Dark Woman who are still convolescing on Serenno under Jenza’s sharp eyes and brisk care, to drop off the mystery woman and… well, her family, whether she is indeed a reincarnated parent to two of them or not.

It is supposed to also drop off the younglings of Clan Shriek-Hawk – whether in age or only appearance – and pick up Mace, Cin and Seire. But the younglings refuse to just stay on Dantooine with the other younglings, and say that they need to be on Korda 6.

And, this, in turn, sparks the offence of the younglings who helped open this temple.

“We came here for you!” says one.

“We got our crystals already. You don’t. so why’d you go and not us?” says another.

The adults wade in when things begin to levitate and fly and limbs begin jabbing.

“You should not expect gratitude, young ones. Not even from your loved ones. You should help because you wish to help and it is the right thing, regardless of any reward you might gain for it,” T’ra says to the younglings she was in charge of for their Gathering.

“You should be able to differentiate between want and need, or even must, and act on just the latter two, or even just the last one, in situations like this,” is what Elta says to her own charges. “We will not be long. We may even bring more people here. so you should help open up a few more rooms and tend to the grounds. This is just a small side-mission. We will still be together at the end of it, Ka’ra grant it.”

“No, we must be there, Master Elta,” Obi-Wan implores, tears of frustration in his eyes. “There are unfamiliar Jedi there, and Mando’ad’e, and we must be the middle ground, or everything will be a massacre.”

The `again` rings clear in the air, even were one not a Force-sensitive.

The other younglings baulk, and so is T’ra. Young children usually do not think and mention about massacres.

But the younglings rally quicker than their caretaker, and mentions of how barbaric, brutal and generally horrible Mandalorians are soon fly, to the sheer outrage of the other party, especially Pre.

“Master Elta is a Mandalorian!” Bruck shrieks, wriggling madly both physically and metaphysically in Elta’s hold, when the adults manage once more to corral the little hellyons. “Master T’ra, too! And Master Fay! And Té!”

“Almost everyone here is a Mandalorian, except for you,” Obi-Wan states coldly, matter-of-factly, in tandem with his semi-former rival, while leaning comfortably, demonstrably against Elta’s armoured legs along with Bant, Pre and Garen.

“Ob’ika,” Elta warns. But the damage is already done. The other set of younglings subside, clumping together and away from T’ra, faces crumpling and eyes wet and shrinking presences bleeding a turmoil of uncertainty-fear-confusion-directionlessness-yearning-surprise-wonderment-curiosity.

But the reaction defangs the younglings of Clan Shriek-Hawk in turn, especially when one of their opponents whispers quietly, plaintively, “I didn’t mean you, Master T’ra. Sorry.” It allows the argument to be tabled and the whole gaggle of younglings to be ushered rather unresistingly to the refurbished crèche wing, where apologies and explanations are had, all round, though still without revealing the real background of the nine time-travellers.

And still, Clan Shriek-Hawk persists.

Now, the other younglings want to go, too.

And, given the time constraint, owing to travel duration from Dantooine to Korda 6, the adults give in.

With the caveat of “No getting out of the ship once we are there.”

And Master Dooku, who is recently fully lucid though not mobile yet, threatens the most boring and/or disgusting tasks for any transgressor. Which is threatening indeed.

Still, Clan Shriek-Hawk, especially the time-travellers among them, has plans.

Chapter Text

Té the kyber is somehow so different from Té the child. Not just in shape and look and state, at that. For one, Té the kyber was so chatty, at first even desperately so, while Té the child is so quiet, and so small both in bearing and the Force, as if afraid of taking up place or being hurt from touching anything. They are wary of everyone – their triad siblings, their blood family, Clan Shriek-Hawk – and constantly look round with their already-large eyes widened even more.

Obi-Wan believes that something went wrong during the transfer from kyber to flesh-and-blood, during the reunion of souls, during what might have come after that. Bant argues that Té is just unaccustomed to being of flesh and blood again, of being a young child instead of a young adult, of being able to reach out and see and all. Luminara theorises that Té is just being so overwhelmed mentally and emotionally, after two sets of memories – from the kyber and from the body – became one as the soul halves that bore them reunited. Quinlan insists that the Force is much more overwhelming when someone interacts with it physically, so he seeks to bundle Té up in clothes and blankets that he chooses himself and carefully adds soft imprints of emotions and thoughts to. Pre thinks nothing of it all but rues the distance between him and his clanmate twice over, and also rues the intervention of the older clan members when he coaxes-bribes-pushes Té to interact with him and everyone else.

But, regardless, Té is important – even pivotal – in a few of the plans for Korda 6, the younglings of Clan Shriek-Hawk – whether the “youngling” status is “true” or just “seeming” – all agree.

The “seeming” status of nine of their number has been slowly but so scarily surely been eroded, anyway, most likely by the deceptively lethal combo of their current biological responses and the social responses and treatment of those round them.

So they need a distraction.

And these plans are a good distraction, yes they are!

*

The Force swirls, agitated, anticipatory. Knol is too trained and experienced to physically perk up, however. Instead, she quickly finishes her last sabotage job with the last “evil Mando” ship that arrived just this morning, sneaks out, and meets up with Nico and Feemor and Ace and Tholme in one of their rare coordination meetings – their last meeting in this mission, most likely, for good or for ill, judging by how the Force behaves.

She reports that she has managed to ground the last of the flight-capable transport belonging to the Mandalorians who have been arming and training kordans only to fight and dangling supplies for their families on their successes and obedience.

Ace reports that his cobbled-together sensor array that piggy-backs on the Mandalorians’ channels has managed to catch readings of a fleet of ships rapidly approaching the planet.

Nico theorises that the new fleet is reinforcement for this one. Tholme disagrees, sayin that there are a few factions of Mandos around, if only Nico would care to nose about for them and not only just for hints of well-backed, big-time, “posh” slavers and slave-rings. Feemor adds fuel to the fire, claiming that he has been getting hints that his… friends?… have been travelling with a hodge-podge of unaligned Mandos, which is also a thing, something which Tholme apparently did not know and never expected, let alone Nico. And a newly arrived someone named Rael Averross jumps in gleefully to point out that the oncoming fleet might not carry Feemor’s friends in it, might be more of the evil Mandos, might be the chatty, Core-like faction – “What’s the name again, Tholme?” – and a whole series of other might-bes.

Knol figuratively and literally sits back, for now, enjoying the conflogration that erupts soon after.

They have time, after all. For now.

Chapter Text

Kit’s furled tresses is the first indication that his mission – persuading “Depa’s future master” to divulge any intel about what situation they will and might be flying into – did not go as planned.

Well, but it’s just Plan A.

*

Reeft is cauht slicing into Seire’s master’s datapad that Quinlan and Obi-Wan and Garen pilfered for him through the age-old way of distract-and-take.

Siri is punished alongside Reeft for throwing the said master all across the room in her panic when the duo got caught sticky-handed.

Consequently, the thieving trio got punished alongside the other two, because of course the owner of the datapad traces the thievery back to them.

The younglings of Clan Shriek-Hawk begin to be worried. This is their Plan B, after all, and they only have so many plans to execute to find the intel before they are on top of Korda-6.

It is also worrying that, judging by how easily this plan is sniffed at, it’s obviously too obvious not to be childish in nature. “Are we degrading?” is a question that haunts eight of the nine reincarnated time-travellers, who once tasted adulthood. One managed to edge into senior citizenship, even, namely Obi-Wan.

It doesn’t help that the other younglings, also sniffing at the brewing plot, clamour to be included, with the all-too-real threat to tattle to the adults if they aren’t allowed to involve themselves in whatever’s going on with Clan Shriek-Hawk.

“But but but – it’s dangerous!” Bant squawks worriedly on the face of the threat.

She receives unimpressed stares for that, and the all-too-reasonable return of, “You are younglings, too. It’s clearly not as dangerous as you think. Besides, we’re supposed to stick together, aren’t we?”

*

Plan C is to take the direct root: cornering a master involved in this mission and asking about it.

The younglings – all of them – corner soon-to-be-Master Mace and ask. Obi-Wan even uses his best charming-negotiator act in this.

It cuts off when Master Mace passes out from what appears to be a shatterpoint headache and Depa, startled and upset and panicked, bursts into tears.

*

Master Elta is the one who foils their Plan D, which is eavesdropping into conversations held by the adults. They even sit the younglings down and ever-so-patiently explains that it’s great they wish to help, but, please, the adults can do their duties better if they needn’t worry about younglings hurt or worse in the process.

Asking the “pure Mandos” for succour only nets them a similar answer, unfortunately.

*

Plan E is to get Té’s reincarnated mum to talk with them, in which they can explain what they wish her to do and hope madly that she will do it for them. But her grasp of past life – including Galactic Basic – is still shaky, and communications are still conveyed largely through Té, who doesn’t approve of what they wish her to do.

`I did not get them back – however unexpectedly – only for you to kill them in a stupid mission that you can instead try to convince the others to do. My parent has not even remembered most of their first life with us,` is what they state implacably, and that’s that.

And the other younglings are leery of alienating them further after whatever has happened to them, which has also given them a flesh-and-blood body albeit a child’s, so there goes this plan.

*

The younglings do not manage to enact Plan F because they are on top of Korda-6 already. And, sadly getting ahead of them, Té’s surviving and eldest sibling “Ba’vodu Fé” coralles them in a locked room with themself and proceeds to watch each of them like the namesake of the clan – both of theirs.

Oh, well.

Chapter Text

Jaster Mereel does his best to keep his honour intact in all things.

It is so very hard to do in his new profession. Warrior-for-hire world – whether it’s as mercenary, assassin, bounty hunter or bodyguard – is ripe with treachery, corruption, underhanded deals, lack of honour – all noisome things. But what does he have now but for his own honour and people who somehow voluntarily follow him into all things? So he must keep them well, and this is his way.

He must give a good example to his adopted child of six years, too. The said adopted child – Jango, son of his late best friend – is even in a delicate stage of development named adolescence, according to the parenting books he has read. A child is growing into an adult in this stage, and seeking their own future self in doing so, and imitating the adults round them while denying they’re doing just that if confronted. Quite fragile, prickly, and frustrating.

In this light, retrieving a patrol of local militia forces on a primitive world belonging to the same – ordinary, barely known – Mid-Rim star system named Korda seems the best choice for a job. It is expense-paying and needful albeit not glorious, most likely safe but also ripe with a potential for adventure, and honourable.

Well, it’s not just Jango who grumbles about it. even Montross grumbles. But Jaster would rather play it as safe as possible. Because Death Watch may have been defeated, but the Republic-backed so-called “New Mandalorians” have been putting more and more and more pressure on the traditionalists like him and his people, and they must continually prove that they are not “savages skilled only in warmongering,” even though for now such “warmongering” works are what keep them and their families fed and clothed and roofed and fuelled and armed.

Being greeted by an ion cannon is not at all the adventure Jaster ever thought of when it comes to Korda 6 the supposedly primitive world, though!

Tegaanalir Marev – their medical frigate! – is the ship struck first by the damned cannon. It is the only one so far, but damn it – it’s a medical ship!

He gives his people a firm order not to engage directly, to spread out and gather as much intel as possible, even as Tegaanalir Marev plummets through the atmosphere at an alarming rate. He also orders his own ship – Sheresh’kartayl – to tail the falling frigate as closely as possible and try to engage the tractor beam to slow the latter’s descent.

Before the two ships can manage to come within range with each other, however, Tegaanalir Marev’s descent is suddenly slowing down, seemingly on its own, even though nothing on it has come back online yet.

And, even odder, there is no more ion beam shot towards them after the first one.

`Further trap?` Jaster tenses up, and he is not the only one.

“Shall we arm up in full, Alor?” Terin offers, his hand hovering on the activation button.

Jaster gives the ship’s weapons specialist a no. but, honestly, he is very tempted to okay the move.

He just doesn’t want whatever – or whoever? – holding their medical ship up to suddenly think they are ungrateful and consequently let it plummet to the unforgiving surface of the planet below.

Well, he rethinks the decision when, upon landing, the two ships are greeted with the sight of a handful of Jetiise standing in the open, looking like they have just finished a feat of strength indeed.

And, near those Republic’s attack massifs, lies the ruins of the culprit of Tegaanalir Marev’s loss of power, surrounded by unconscious – or dead? – Mando’ad’e in Death Watch armour.

“What do you want from us?” is perhaps not the most diplomatic greetings in Coreworld standard, but it encompasses most of the questions Jaster wishes to ask the Jetiise, so he goes ahead with it.

And to say that the answer is bizarre is an understatement of the millennium.

Chapter Text

Being in Mandalorian armour in addition to being robed as a Jedi is… a novel experience, especially since Cin is wearing this combo in the open. For the first time, to boot.

knowing that three others are also wearing this particular dress is even more bizarre. Painful, as well, although Cin tries not to dwell on it. Just, this should have been reality since long ago, given his parentage and who inducted him into the Order.

But here they all are: ten Jedi of apparently two sects, standing in the open in front of “pure” Mandalorians after slowing the descent of the latter group’s medical frigate, exhausted after trying to keep everyone aboard the dead ship alive during the descent, with evidence of incapacitated Mandalorians and one recently butchered ion cannon strewn damningly near.

And what looks like the lead Mando – judging by that red cape that nobody else is wearing – has just demanded, “What do you want from us?”

A very wary, very defensive opening, also pretty flammable in regard to both parties, from what Cin knows. And Cin has not forgotten the details of any of his missions that gave him this experience, despite the fact that he has been temple-bound for the most of these two years, teaching defence and combat classes.

And… yes, that’s Mace, bristling like a prodded porcupine… or maybe a nexu cub, given how the latter’s hand is inching openly closer to his lightsabre.

Cin’s heart sinks. And it doesn’t really get back up when Nico pushes him from behind and he has no choice but to stumble forward, setting himself apart from his nine comrades.

And, predictably, all attention is on him, now… while he has no idea what to say. He is a guard and sometimes an undercover agent and a teacher, not a diplomat!

Fortunately, E’bu then nudges encouragingly at him through their reestablished bond and says, `Tell the truth, Brightling.`

He can make an on-the-spot verbal report, tell the truth as it is, as he knows it, so he just does it, detailing the assignment the High Council gave one of them to gather info about Mandalorian infighting that has spilt this far into Republic Space, the findings about a group of Mandalorian manipulating the natives here and seeming about to trap another group that might be the one the Jedi are facing right now, and how the original info-gatherer had to call for reinforcements to help diffuse the situation as bloodlessly as possible.

He says nothing about the missing – now long found – children who triggered this unofficial mission, of course. Sequestering them – as well as all the padawans – aboard their transport in orbit for this occasion would have been defeated by that. But the recital is otherwise polished, if he says so himself, and–.

“Why are you in our armour?”

… Oh. This is another matter entirely!

With that in mind, Cin motions to E’bu – who is standing to his left and glaring at him – with one hand, before retaking his earlier position and making sure to root himself on the soil nearly as ardantly as Master T’ra might, to prevent more pushes from his traitorous comrades.

And, back in relative safety, he listens just as avidly as the Mandos across from them as E’bu tells them all about how Tarre Vizsla and their siblings gathered like-minded Jedi and Mandalorians to form a blended sect, how their temple – their home – on Mandalore was bombed first by the Republic forces during the Excision, how they then scattered into anonymyty in order to just live, how some who dared show themselves openly – like E’bu’s family – were oftentimes eliminated with prejudice by a few elements in Mandalorian society, and how they hope that this occasion will not be just yet another slaughter in the making, as they seek to mediate between the Jedi and the Mandalorians like one of their original remits dictates.

It's harsh, but it’s history, Cin’s history that was previously unknown, and he stands straighter under the weight of the responsibility.

He can do no less.

Chapter Text

“I wanna take a look at those ships!” Garen hisses when the exploradroid Quinlan has “borrowed” for them in one of the latter’s snooping missions throughout the ship, which Garen himself has personally snuck aboard Whistling Bird 3 that brought the contingent down to Korda 6, now shows the avid viewers the rows upon rows of disabled ships that all bear the weird symbol that is, on hindsight, also present on the ironheart of Master T’ra’s, Master Fay’s, and Té’s hardshells.

“Later!” Obi-Wan whinges. “Redirect it! I want to see how the confrontation goes on.”

“We’ll be found out for sure if we snoop on the meeting,” Luminara points out reasonably.

“Why not have the droid perch in some tree, then? There are lots of trees down there,” Pre suggests. “Lots of cover. Lots of good angles. As long as it doesn’t rustle too much.”

Kit scowls at them, remembering the nexu incident that firstly brought the then inhabitants of whistling Bird 3 into contact with Jon. “And how much can anybody guarantee that the droid won’t make a sound?” he huffs.

Silence reigns supreme for a while, as nobody has an answer to that. And, on the big datapad propped up on the wall opposite the gaggle of preteens, images of empty, slightly damaged ships continue to parade under the control of the joystick in Garen’s hands.

But, “Did you see the person sneaking among the ships, there? Go back! Go back!” Lilo, a selonian youngling who went on a Gathering recently, suddenly yells at Garen and tries to take the joystick away from him.

And she succeeds.

“No – where – let me!” Garen snaps, chasing after her, weaving among all the other children that are either gaping at the two of them or looking between them and the datapad.

Siri huffs impatiently after a beat, and jumps up to snatch the datapad away from the wall. “C’mon, let’s check,” she says, and jabs the huge thing at Keli, who as a togruta possesses good motion-based eyesight, even better than a selonian, even though he’s still a youngling.

And, when he does check the footages, he does find something.

Or rather, more than a few someones, including a couple of armoured Mandalorians bearing the sigil that’s also on the sabotaged ships and the ironhearts of the triad siblings’ hardshells.

“Death Watch,” Obi-Wan, who crowds Keli at the opposite side of Siri, hisses with displeasure. “They’re going to ambush everyone! Do we have a usable commline with one of them – Master T’ra, maybe?”

“Don’t jump to conclusion so hastily, Obi,” Luminara rebukes. “Remember Galidran.”

“But if we don’t act now–!” Obi-Wan is anxious now.

“We can always warn them.” Quinlan takes the datapad from Keli’s hands and dances away a little awkwardly with the unwieldy thing from three pairs of hands that try to get it back. “Hey! Let me talk to Master Tholme, okay? Won’t be long.”

Well, unfortunately all the commotion attracts Ba’vodu Farre’s attention. Because then they stir awake from their meditation – or perhaps sleep – at the corner by the door and order everyone to cease running and yelling and talking.

And then they order Quinlan, who is in possession of the datapad – their datapad – at present, to start talking.

He shows them the relevant footage instead, and tells them that he wishes to call his master to warn the contingent of a possible ambush by Death Watch and Kordan natives.

But then Ba’vodu Farre grunts, “No need. I tell my child and spouse. They are down there and hidden. They can find out about these people without disrupting the meeting.”

And all the children gawp at that.

Because none of them ever thought of this solution.

And, soon after, various Kordan natives and the couple of Death Watch personnel fall unconscious on the exploradroid footage without a sound, without an audible call relayed, with none the wiser.

Well, all Quinlan can say to that is, “Neat!”

And nobody refutes him.

Chapter Text

Being in charge of verd’e is unnerving, even though it’s also a proud, proud moment, since Jango is only fourteen and newly past his verd’goten.

On that note, being in charge of his friends is both a boon and a curse. Because they’re his friends and he’s well-acquainted with all of their strengths, weaknesses and preferences. But it’d also hit him harder if he made the wrong choice or he had to discipline any of them.

Fortunately, Jas’bu has an easy mission for them for his debut as a commander, with lots of backup at that, however much his pride – and that of his new subordinates – chafes at it. They’re to rescue a squad of trainees on a backwater planet, this time, and Jas’bu’s deployed three companies to do that: Jas’bu’s own Headhunters, Montross’ Vertigos, and Jango’s Grunts.

But the mission’s turned out to be… more unique than Jango thought, and therefore more hair-raisingly… interesting. Because their medical ship got shot down unprovoked by a previously unknown – previously unreported – ion cannon. And it slowed down before Jas’bu’s ship’s tractor beam could lock onto it.

And now all three companies are standing facing two handfuls of jetiise on a planet where there’s again no report of those nosy Republic’s attack massifs present. And the damn jetiise look tired because they helped a fully disabled Mando ship land safely with all its personnel and equipment intact, while butchering the ion cannon responsible for it and neutralising suspiciously many Kyr’tsadiise, all with no request previously submitted to them by anybody.

Well, the explanation for all that makes sense, if surprising, given how notoriously long the request for jetii aid could linger unfulfilled. But, on second thought, maybe it’s really not surprising? Some of these jetiise are somehow also Mando’ad’e, after all, if Jango understands the second jetii’s fantastical additional explanation correctly.

Anyway, the would-be ambush of Kyr’tsad is far more alarming and of the Haat’ad’e’s concern, in more ways than one. Because this means that they do have a leak – a huge leak – among their own ranks, like many of them have suspected for some time already, given all the successful ambushes by Kyr’tsad and all the disappearances and the near-successful assassination on Jas’bu and Jango himself.

It also means that, when a previously undetected humongous Mando’ad – huger than Ruu’bu, even! – marches towards them along with other unknown Mando’ad’e, bringing with them a handful of struggling but weaponless Kyr’tsadiise and native Kordans, all Haat’ad’e tense up.

Not the jetiise, though, and Montross speaks up, Quite accusingly, about why they aren’t informed about this, and if the jetiise have other agendas regarding this “omission.”

Which the first jetii speaker retorts to by saying that the jetiise aren’t all-knowing, and wouldn’t exert so much energy to save Tegaanalir Marev if they meant harm to whoever inside, Mando or not.

Which is… fair, and makes sense.

And Montross replies by trying to shoot the jetii down.

Jango watches, wide-eyed and speechless, as the red bolt snaps towards the unprotected neck of the jetii, only to be flicked back towards him by not the jetii’s sword but their vambrace.

Quite a Mando thing to do.

But, contrarily, Montross ducks from the attack, while knowing that his subordinates are standing behind him.

And the bolt’s heading right towards a frozen rooky verd.

While the others are equally frozen by this tableau.

From the Mando side, that is. Because there’s suddenly a blur and the poor rooky’s on the ground along with others on the path of the bolt and the bolt’s sailing past all of them and it obliterates the top of a sapling when it reaches its end.

Jango feels nauseated, now.

Montross must have tinkered with his blaster again and upped the punching power. If it hit the rooky – who is of the same age as Jango himself, even though he knows practically nothing about her….

Jas’bu must have the same thought, for, unhesitatingly, he shoots Montross down with a barrage of stunbolts and orders Myles and Silas to bring the now-insensate coward away.

Jango’s gaze is drawn away from the sight of the two verd’e hauling Montross away – none too gently, at that – only when there’s some shifting from where Montross was positioned. And he gets the second shock of the local afternoon when he finds that the blur turns out to have been the jetii who flicked away Montross’ killbot.

“Kandocyii’la,” he blurts out, and some verd’e laugh awkwardly on that very inappropriate proclamation.

One laughs loudly, however – jagged, rusty, startled from the depths of restricted lungs, like the first time Jango laughed after Ruu’bu and Ko’bu and A’vod were murdered – and the sound comes from not among the companies Jas’bu brought for this cowardly trap of a mission.

It’s familiar, and not only in quality, and Jango finds himself trotting towards the originator of that sound before he realises he’s moving.

And his company are moving behind him.

And the laughter turns louder in response, nstead of petering out or even choking off.

And it comes from one of the Kyr’tsadiise, who is personally restrained by the humongous Mando’ad.

“Tion gar?” (“Who are you?”) Jango demands, now unnerved and somehow afraid.

And he knows why when the probably unhinged verd sing-songs just as brokenly, “Arla Vhett, striil be Mand’alor Vizsla.” (“Arla Fett, strill of Soul-Ruler Vizsla.”)

Chapter Text

Jaster never thought that an armourer – judging by that giant warhammer hanging from that gigantic Mando’ad’s belt – would ever deploy themself on a battlefield like this.

He never thought that he would be dragged aside only to be scolded severely by them for caving into Jango’s wish to lead the latter’s own company, too, once the leadership of the three companies comes up in the discussion after the would-be ambushers were caught and detained.

Nor would he ever think in a million years or more that Jango’s sister would have still lived till this day. He would have done his best to rescue her, if not!

He swears it to the armourer, and to Jango, and to Arla as well, after he has recovered even slightly from the horribly shocking revelation.

Then a ship touches down and, instead of what warriors the armourer may have brought with them, it disgorges a bunch of children, headed by one just as massif but even more stoic than the armourer is.

Most of the sapient would-be nuna chicks are young, too.

And the armourer only huffs exasperatedly to that.

What a double standard!

If Jaster were younger, he would have cried a protest. Not to say that he is much more patient and diplomatic, this day. The shocks that have been bombarding him just happen to manage to keep his mouth shut long enough.

Just long enough to witness it, as not a few of the children take in the would-be battlefield and the recent site of a confrontation with practised eye.

“What do your children do everyday, Armourer?” he can’t help but squawk, shocked – again – and upset and… just… confused, because those who seem the most practised with warfare and/or diplomacy also seem barely old enough to start gentle training!

But the one who answers is not the armourer.

No, they are one of the children – one of the smallest ones, in fact, hair gleaming red under Kordan sunlight – who snorts, shakes their head, and pipes into the suddenly very, very, very silent air in a voice far too young for their words, with a gaze far too old for their face, “Would you believe us if we told you that, a few decades from now, a galactic civil war would break, and we’re involved in it?”

There is no humour in their tone, no impudence, no boasting, no defiance. Just a factual statement. And it hits Jaster like he’d imagine a point-blank cannon blast would.

And he is not the only one suffering from that, judging by how tense and roiling the silent air suddenly is.

Which in turn make all the children stiffen, with the “war experts” spreading out a little and taking a ready stance, while the rest huddle together, just like ordinary discomfitted and afraid children would.

Which just serves to highlight how true the statement is, if – he suspects – incomplete, and he would rather it not be confirmed, please!

Galactic conquest should have been left long in the past of all Mando’ad’e. And even if it were not Mando’ad’e inciting the war, the grim chaos of wartime is never good for anybody but for greedy weaponsmiths, slavers, pirates and smugglers.

`How can I prevent this? Jan’ika should not inherit such a fate!`

And, faced with such discomfort, he wants – needs – his own child close. So he calls for Jango to stand beside him, introduces himself and his child to the visiting children in a would-be casual, warm tone….

And stutters to an awkward stop when he realises that the same war-weary-looking handful of the said children focus their attention on Jango instead of him, with a look that makes his heart sink down to his booted toes.

`Jan’ika, what were you going to do in the future that might be?`

Chapter Text

“He looks so… awkward, and small, and unsure,” is the first thing that any of the nine time-travellers says, the moment they are left only among themselves, which is very rare by now, after that stunt. And this particular wondering-statement-question comes from Obi-Wan, who tattled to all and sundry ABOUT THE TIME TRAVEL, although not quite blatantly – the only thing that saves him from prolonged serious castigation from his original clanmates.

“Not bounty-hunter material, huh?” Bruck comments, curious and amused, unwilling to castigate his one-time rival and start an argument that would attract the adults’ attention.

“Not the sort to sell his own children to his enemies in the name of revenge,” Quinlan pipes in, more than slightly acquainted with what it means to a Mando after what Obi-Wan has shared in their previous life and what he himself has been experiencing along with the others in this one.

`What changed, to change him so drastically?` is in all their minds, and will likely sit there forever. Because this Jango is not their Jango. Just like this Maul is not their Maul, and Asajj likewise – thankfully!

`Did we just create another universe on the death of the other one? Or does the other one remain, still on an utter-desolation course parallel to this one’s progression?` is that question’s mate, equally unanswered and most likely unanswerable.

And then they have no more time for themselves, because the aforementioned beings – still children, even younger than these nine’s bodies are! – as well as the five who firstly flew away from Coruscant with them have managed to track them to this little nook in the ship they used to travel to Korda 6, which is now en route back to Dantooine instead of going on to Coruscant.

And they do not look impressed. At all.

“Lady Temmy was asking after you,” Agen delivers curtly. “It’s mealtime and you’re not there. We’re just waiting for you.”

“Lady Temmy?” Obi-Wan echoes dumbly.

“Lady Temmy.” It’s Tiplar this time, sighing with disappointment. Serious disappointment. Which verges on – if not smack-dab in – the territory of castigation.

It’s not just Obi-Wan who winces, because the disappointment is aimed not only at him.

“Should we know her?” he tries for conciliation, still. Apologetic. Curious. Wondering. All genuine.

Tiplee snorts to that, and glumly points out. “It’s what happened when you don’t speak to her, with her. Nobody likes being used, you know, or being made a spectacle.”

The nine bristle.

The five look-feel-behave even more unimpressed.

Asajj, Maul, Savage and Feral look between the two as if watching a game they do not know yet the rules for.

“She’s Té’s mum,” Kit tries for a calming tone of his own, though it’s hard when Depa is imitating Master Mace’s most-displeased self beside him. “You spied on her. Then you asked Té to ask her to wade in-between the Jedi and the Mandalorians.”

He waves a hand when Bruck, Siri and Aalto squawk. “No, let me finish,” he sighs, now exasperated. “Nobody objected to that plan, so we’re also at fault for that, but wwe aren’t looking for who’s at fault now.”

“Don’t beat round the bush,” Bruck huffs.

Kit shrugs to that, more obliging than ambivalent. But it’s Depa who snaps out, “You’re so secretive, so condescending, so…. Sometimes you don’t feel like you’re all here. Sometimes you behave like you’re people playing dejarik, and everyone else are your pieces, to move as you deem right. But nobody likes being a piece in somebody else’s game, you know. I bet you don’t, either. And it was worst at the beginning, but it’s been getting worse again. Just… just… talk, will you? If not with the masters then with us. We’re your clan, aren’t we? Or is it just part of your game?”

`Oh,` the nine think, now dumbstruck. `Seen this way….`

Chapter Text

Slowly, stutteringly, sometimes reluctantly, the story comes out. At long last. In full. with all the nine participating.

Agen stops the “hyperlane collision” – or so the five dub! – and runs to fetch Knight Feemor when the retelling comes to Xanatos du Crion and how he Fell – not died!

It’s not just Knight Feemor that arrives, however, but all the Jedi crew. Even Elta, whose presence necessitates another explanation regarding the existing Mandalorian Jedi sect.

“This is how secrets can hurt everyone and their plans, I suppose,” is Feemor’s only remark after the “Xanatos saga” has been fully retold, wry and faintly bitter.

When the others prod, he huffs and reluctantly, hesitantly admits, “Master Dooku has just commed me. And, in-between news exchanges, he said Xan didn’t die, just Fell. I was in fact about to search for someone to help keep Ace safe while I confront Xan and… bring him home, most likely, if everyone is all right with it. he was an entitled little brat, but he was sixteen, and he is… probably seventeen, now.”

Obi-Wan does not like it.

But then again, he was once enslaved by an older version of the said entitled little brat in the deep sea mines on Bandomeer, wasn’t he?

Feemor exchanges looks and Force-borne sensations with Mace, Tholme, Rael, Cin and Master T’ra.

In the end, they decide that Rael will offer himself to take Xanatos as his padawan and, if Xanatos agrees, spend the padawanship travelling all round the Outer Rim instead of staying on Dantooine, where the all the younglings will be corralled. Mind-healing will be mandatory but not limited to Jedi healers, semi-regular contact with Jedi will likely be limited to all the other wandering ones such as Master Ven’nari and Master Diath, and all pertinent parties will decide together later on if Xanatos is ready to rejoin the greater Jedi community, continue as is, or even leave the Jedi Order.

On hindsight, however tricky and delicate the balance of decision is for that particular individual, it is nothing compared to partway down the resumption of the retelling, after the various wars that children as young as Obi-Wan and Quinlan… are? Were? Would be? Would have been?… involved in, when the nine little time-travellers talk about the Trade Federation’s invasion of Naboo, and Obi-Wan confesses that he and his master faced down a Sith apprentice.

“There are always two: the master and the apprentice.” Tholme’s voice is strangled.

And at least half of the nine scoff to that.

“In theory,” Obi-Wan explains when the adults give them a reproachful look. “But in actuality, the master was still aprenticed to another Sith at that time. We thought so, at least. On hindsight. After some timeline calculation.”

Oh, and how bitter such a young being is, at the end!

And how horrifying, when quiet little Reeft murmurs into the resulting tense hush, “I died tracing down the master. Not the one apprenticing the Sith Obi killed, but that one’s master.”

He shivers, and gratefully burrows into Elta’s hug when she offers it.

The brave little one does not need any prompting to continue, however, after that. Not that the adults wish to hear what he has to say.

“It’s Hego Damask Two, Magister of Damask Holdings of the Intergalactic Banking Clans. And his apprentice was Senator then Supreme Chancellor Sheev Palpatine.”

There is no mention of the Sith apprentice, but none of the adults pry.

Neither do they look at Maul, who is a shivery little ball that loudly screams `Don’t look at me!` in the Force at the edge of the crowd.

Not directly, at least. And not judgmentally, in any case.

Maul is tiny, and clearly accepted by the other children, even the time-travelling ones. The youngest Sith apprentice has been neutralised, then, as cold as the thought is when applied to such a young child.

That leaves the two other Sith at large. And perhaps more – more Sith, more large-scale troubles, more chains of them…. But they know, now, and they can even learn from what did not work last time – as odd as that thought still feels!

They know, and the little time-travellers need not work alone on this – or at all, but none of the adults actually have any hope that the children will take being sidelined and treated as mere children well.

So… yes, compromise.

And perhaps, this time, the galaxy will truly be a better place.