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Boba settled down next to the Mandalorian on the passager deck. Fennec was manning the Slave 1’s controls. Dune had muttered something about cleaning her blaster and vanished into the maintenance room. And the Mandalorian…
Fennec had told Boba about the Jedi appearing and taking the child, about the Mandalorian taking their helmet off to say goodbye. The helmet was back on, but the Mandalorian looked like they were suffering more than just grief over giving up the child.
Call it a hunch.
“What’s eating at you, Mandalorian?” Boba asked into the silence of the passenger bay.
The Mandalorian flinched. Their runi actually scurried a tight circle in his lap before returning to the tight ball it had been in. Boba didn’t know the species, a not uncommon problem in a galaxy as large as this one. Runi could settle as a creature from your birth planet, a planet you visited once, or even something you’d only seen in books. Made for some fun research, trying to figure out what an enemy’s soul said about them.
Vicious, fast, sharp teeth and claws. Capable of hiding, laying in wait, and taking every hit that came its way. Boba knew that much. Though the beskar armor plates lapping down the runi’s back helped with the last one.
“Skywalker is an ass, but his rep won’t let him do wrong by the child.” And if Boba had to call his favor in with Skywalker’s friend, Princess Organa, he would. He owed the Mandalorian that and more for returning his armor to him.
“Grogu trusted him.” Mando was still studying their hands instead of anything else. Made Boba wonder just how many bruises were under those armor plates. Still, the words sounded strong and confident, so the head injury couldn’t be too bad.
“Then what’s the problem?” Boba cocked his head a moment before adding, “Mandalorian.”
Another flinch, another scurry.
“I’m not…”
“A Mandalorian?” Dune had mentioned some passing thing about not being able to take the helmet off and remain a Mandalorian. It was a new one to Boba, but he’d come across more than a few ways to be a Mandalorian in his life.
Of course, most of them were quick to insist that their way most definitely could not include Boba.
The Mandalorian sadly shook his head. “No. Not since I took the helmet off on Morak.”
“One set of armor for another,” Boba said with a dismissive wave.
“Mayfield froze. I had to let the system scan my face.” The Mandalorian looked ready to be sick. “I couldn’t leave without the info.”
“Your creed really has no exceptions? Not for your child?”
“To take off the armor is to give up your soul,” the Mandalorian said all too softly. It sounded like a quote.
“Bantha shit,” Boba spat firmly. He stroked a shaking hand over Korra’s head. He knew what it felt like to lose your soul. He’d been down in that sarlacc’s belly, Korra above him on the sands, trapped, waiting, their bond stretched beyond what anyone should endure. It had been worse than the sarlacc acid. “Your soul is right there, in your lap.”
The Mandalorian’s gaze settled on Boba finally.
“Being a Mandalorian gives you armor, armors your soul if you’re lucky. But you are born with a soul.”
“Why doesn’t your soul wear armor?”
Well, that hadn’t been what Boba expected. “My father’s armor fits me fine, but his soul was a bird.” Boba gave his canid runi a pat on the head. “Nothing Tolan wore would fit this fine fellow.” Even if Boba had been able to find the small plates in the dust of the arena after Tolan scattered to dust at his father’s death.
“A armorer—”
Boba cut him off with a bark of laughter. “No armorer would armor my soul. Not a Mandalorian, remember?”
The Mandalorian cocked their head. “Your father was a foundling.”
“Once. But he had his creed torn from him and was declared dar’manda before I was decanted. Part of the unfortunate mess that was the Mandalorian Civil War and the Clone Wars.” Not that Boba had a much clearer understanding of the situation than what he’d just said. Jango hadn’t talked about his past, and no one was willing to tell the same story twice. If they knew anything. A lot of the people who had known something had died in the wars.
“Difference between us,” Boba said, sensing another protest building from the Mandalorian, “is I never swore a creed or claimed to be a Mandalorian. I was just born to one. You, on the other hand, have lived and breathed being Mandalorian most of your life. How does one thing make that change without you choosing to agree?”
The Mandalorian’s runi started to unravel their ball, little eyes coming up to study Boba and Jaster. “We could stop being Mandalorian.”
Well, that was new. Mando’s daemon had a deep voice for such a little thing.
“You could, if you chose to. Do you want to stop being Mandalorian?”
The runi scampered up the Mandalorian’s armor and slung themself over beskar clad shoulders.
“No.” It was the Mandalorian themself who spoke this time.
“Then don’t. You have the armor, the weapons, the tendency to adopt anything that moves. Seems pretty Mandalorian to me.”
“You could swear.” Huh. The runi was speaking again.
“No one would accept our oath,” Korra said, to Boba’s surprise. His runi wasn’t the chatty type either.
“We would,” Mando’s daemon said.
“Thought you weren’t a Mandalorian anymore,” Boba commented dryly to cover the way his heart was pounding.
The Mandalorian cocked their head, then with visible hesitance removed their helmet.
They were older than Boba had first thought, some gray in their hair. The mustache was cute. And, kark it, there was definitely a head injury. Their pupils were all over the place.
“I think… If Bo-Katan Kryze can be a Mandalorian, we refuse to be denied.”
Boba laughed as he reached for the medkit. “I like you, Mandalorian. Hold that strength of heart and let’s get your patched up.”