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For Grogu it started with his parent wanting him to find a Jedi teacher.
Grogu wasn’t opposed to a teacher. He knew he could help his parent better with more control over his Force sensitivity. He could also catch bigger frogs with high jumps and telekinesis powers.
More frogs would be good for him.
Yes, Grogu didn’t mind a teacher at all.
So, while Grogu sat on Tython trying to call for a Jedi, he knew he wanted the kind of Jedi that would let him stay with his parent. Buir was being stupid while wanting to leave him with some enemy sorcerer and feeling awful about it in silence. Grogu knew this since he could feel his parent’s feelings very clearly in the Force, even with the beskar muffling things a little. His parent was the one he was most accustomed to and Grogu understood him while he didn’t always understand Grogu. It didn’t matter. His parent was a good one, one who kept him safe and cared for, mostly. They couldn’t do anything about other people being bad and after Grogu. His parent tried and cared more than anyone else Grogu remembered.
Mind made up he settled down and reached out.
Meditation was familiar for him and calling into the Force took effort, but this place was very powerful in the Force and Grogu was one with the Force and the Force was with him.
They called for someone who could teach him and live with Grogu and his buir, someone who was a strong fighter.
A Jedi did answer, Grogu was pleased to find out and cooed happily, eyes still closed.
*-*
For Jon Antilles it started while his life was ending in pure burning agony.
The pain came from the lava destroying his upper body and from the sickening feel of Durge’s Dark side corrupting his senses like the lava impeding his breathing. It was hot, uncomfortable, painful, and made him wish for the Force’s cool balm on his being. He wanted to escape, like so many times while training with the Dark Woman and having to endure pain day after day. He also wanted to learn this new skill to escape the pain and mostly he did, after some painful failures. But here and now there wasn’t a lesson to be learnt by Dark Woman, there didn’t seem to be any other end than death in the Force for him.
Jon couldn’t concentrate enough to reach for the Force to teleport or glide through Durge’s grip, not when he had his Force sense pinned on Jon like a separating cloak. At least that’s how it was, until he heard the sudden call, just as Durge gave that one last thrust to heave him under. Jon could feel himself being called through the Force, to a place not here and in that moment, it seemed like the most wonderful place in the galaxy to be. He had a new destination to go by the will of Force and Jon always followed it without question. That was why, it was easier than dying to reach out, accept the call and fold the space between them into a single fall through the cracks. At the same time, his newly released hand went to his face, a push of healing to help him prepare for the call. The Force always wated him ready to fight, ready to defend some new being. In this, Jon would be ready, too.
This close to death, he was so close to being one with the Force that pain didn’t seem to matter much, the dark didn’t seem to matter much.
There was only the Force and his new calling.
Jon fell and he landed and so it all began anew.
He didn’t die that day, but there wouldn’t be an Order left to file another false death for Jon Antilles when he reappeared some thirty years in the future.
*-*
For Din Djarin it started like another day to vie for the spot of the worst day in his life.
He came to Tython to find a Jedi to teach Grogu and take him with them. That.. shouldn’t have felt like a piece of his broken heart breaking again.
The day worsened when another ship landed on the planet, and he was once again being hunted by the imps who wanted his son! Charge… he meant charge, obviously. Then there was another new player wanting the Mandalorian armour he had won from Cobb Vanth, with an assassin he thought he’d killed with him, threatening Grogu. But finally, after fighting off the ground troops, his heart stilled in seeing the black troopers fly to take Grogu, who was no longer encased in blue light, but held in some stranger’s arms.
The stranger was a sorry sight with burned, tattered robes, a scarred face and black ash on every piece of him. He looked like he rose from a battlefield razed by fire and Din had no idea where he appeared from. When the troopers came, Din was too far away from it all to do anything. When they scooped up his kid, he could only watch and let out a stifled noise of loss. The stranger went with them, and Din turned to his ship, wanting to follow if nothing else. Things weren’t over yet, he wasn’t letting Grogu go to imps or some man he hadn’t vetted (threatened) first.
When the missile was coming for his beloved Razor Crest, he could only watch – as it hit right beside the ship, actually missing it but for some shrapnel tinkling from the hull. Din could only stare once more.
Boba, stood beside him, let out a thoughtful, “Huh. Haven’t seen that bad aiming before, even from imps.”
Din didn’t stay to hear what he had to say but ran for the ship, rushing in to get it into the air. The system opened easily, the ship lifting up fast, and he managed to evade the firing coming from the karking huge fighter just outside the atmosphere. He didn’t care if Boba was following with Shand, he just wanted to reach Grogu and stay alive for that reunion. The black troopers were already in the ship and its firing was surprisingly… non-existent.
Din didn’t care. He flew the Crest in, got out and followed the-- carnage?? He didn’t care! Deeper into the hallways, grey and empty but for severed limbs of black metal. There were scorch marks on the walls and ceiling but no blood, which Din took as a good sign. His sensors were picking up some heat signatures behind doors, which he shot down readily. He didn’t want to fight his way out, too, or come out into an ambush with the kid. There was a corridor that divided the way, both sides held pieces of severed machinery. Din took right by instinct and didn’t linger on his choice, feet pelting down the distance to his kid. His breath was controlled like a soldier’s must be, but his heart seemed to beath a second too fast in his chest. The blaster was a comfortable weight in his hand, the spear on his back a good choice if it came down to that strange sword the Moff had. It was a Jedi weapon, but Din had done alright against a Jedi. And that woman hadn’t had his kid as a hostage.
Gideon didn’t stand a chance (he hoped).
The lights flickered overhead, and Din ran faster: there was some noise coming from up ahead. He ran a corner and skidded into a scene of fighting, the stranger had a green laser blade he swung around (explained those burn marks) Grogu was standing in a corner, big eyes looking around curiously, and the Moff was looking ready to slip out of the room while the other people stalled the stranger with his glow sword for him. Din set his feet and growled low in his throat. He wouldn’t let the man go again. If he did, Grogu would remain to be hunted. He didn’t want to think about how the stranger had a glow sword that was a Jedi weapon and had looked out for Grogu, it was easier to look at the Moff and fight him one last time, for Grogu.
The Moff saw him and drew the black sword, Din hadn’t waited for that and shot at him, two precise shots that the man avoided, skilled fighter for all his cowardly ways. In close quarters, the fighting became a blur where he shielded the hits with his pauldrons until he drew the spear after gaining some ground by firing a round at the not so heavily armoured Gideon. For all that he’d sacked Mandalore, he hadn’t made superior armour for himself. Din found that stupid for all that it would have been an even bigger affront to Mandalorians. It also helped him now. He was a skilled warrior on a good day, now with the stranger keeping the others away, he had Gideon all to himself and fought him to the ground, one jab or block of his spear at a time.
Distantly, he could hear Grogu coo at him.
Finally, with one last sweep, the Moff was on his back, the spear aiming for his head, knocking him out. Din wanted to find out first if there was a bounty on him and if there were others after Grogu than just him. In reverse order. Making sure the man was out cold, he picked up the black sword, curious about it and how it would be to fight with one, and went to Grogu since all the other fighting had ceased in the control room, he now noticed they were in.
“Kid”, he said, voice breaking, although the vocoder mostly hid that fact. He couldn’t get other words out but that was enough. Grogu squealed and ran to him, tiny hands outstretched. Din cooped him up, bringing his negligible weight to his neck, feeling Grogu’s hand land on his cloth-cowered skin. A breath shuddered out of him even as he kept one eye on the Stranger, who stood a good distance away, sword gone but for the hilt in his hand. He looked even worse up close, ready to keel over at the first little blow. Din had just seen him take out a whole ship full of black troopers and other people, though, so he wasn’t signing him off as a non-threat, though.
“Are you a Jedi?” he asked, since that seemed the most appropriate, all things considered. He needed to know if he had to give Grogu up.
“Yes”, the man croaked out, his voice sounding like he’d drank some ash, too, and not just swam in it, “Jedi Master Jon Antilles. May I inquire if you are this youngling’s parent? And why you called for me? The Child wasn’t very forthcoming, I’m afraid.”
Din took a moment to steady himself. This was it. This was the Jedi Grogu had called to teach him. At least he seemed a good fighter.
“I am the Mandalorian tasked with reuniting Grogu with one of his kind, to teach him in ways I cannot”, he said. The man seemed to pale for a moment, before he breathed out visibly and seemed to find some new strength.
“I can bring him to Corusc-“, he started to say but a very loud vail from Grogu shut him up very quickly, his pale eyes locking with Grogu’s determined glare. Din took a protective hold over his kid for the long moment of silence where the two only stared at each other. Then the man paled again, sat down with his legs crossed and was quiet for another long while. Then he opened his eyes, hand going to his head to steady it as his features screamed of terrible pain and loss.
“No”, he said, whispering, “What… What has happened? How long has it been?”
“How long since when?” Din asked, not liking how left out of the conversation he was.
“The start of the Clone Wars”, the man asked.
Din frowned, thinking for a second before answering: “31 years”, he said and the man had to breathe in again, his face twisted in pain.
“I see”, he said, “You called me from a long way, Grogu. And it seems like there are no other Jedi I can bring you to.”
The words seemed to cleave him in two and Din was uncomfortably reminded of his youth and the recent sacrifice of his covert in help of Grogu. The Jedi had lost everything, too. He could sympathise. But he had to ask, so he couldn’t like the man.
“But you’ll take him? You’ll train him to be a Jedi?”
The Jedi, this man who looked like a dead man walking but fought like the devil, grimaced and said: “No. I’m not taking him.”
And Din felt both angry and elated at the same time.
This day was not going any better than it had started with.
*-*
Boba Fett had started the day feeling hopeful after a long search finally bearing fruit.
And the day had gone well: he had his armour back. It felt like he could move right again, move like a proud legacy for his father and not a disgraced son any longer. Fennec shadowed him and wryly watched him stretch out his limbs like a young boy again.
The day would have stayed absolutely perfect if the imperial star fighter hadn’t parked itself over the planet they were on and kidnapped the bounty hunter’s kid. Boba had to help him, too, even if the man stupidly flew his single ship up after it was saved from being blasted to pieces by some truly horrible aiming. Boba didn’t even know it was possible to aim wrong with an assisting computer. Fennec’s twisted mouth said the same, when they turned back to take the Slave 1 up to follow the stupid Mandalorian dad getting himself killed.
The day turned out better when the star fighter seemed unwilling to try to hit them with anything and there weren’t even any shields stopping craft from getting in. There was some personnel, who they took care of fast. The nearest corpses already in the hold were resting on the ramp up to the old Razor Crest. Fennec inspected one and let out a disgusted noise.
“It’s too easy. And I wonder how that Mando is as good as he is if he is as stupid as this.” She held out one hand, on which rested a homing beacon.
“At least we know how the imps found him”, Boba ground out, “Disable it but save it. We better educate him on simple survival later on.”
As they cleared the hangar and the areas not littered with black trooper bits, he pondered on the burn marks on the Black Troopers. He hadn’t seen anything like it since the wars and the odd job for Vader. Lightsabre marks. A good hunter knew what his prey looked like. Boba had brought in his fair share of Jedi doing jobs as a bounty hunter. Until the friend of one shot him down and into a karking Sarlacc.
Now with no Vader, no Sidious and no Jabba, it seemed like a perfect time to try something new for a change.
After he helped this Mando out, of course.
The helping seemed to go about suspiciously easily. And when they met the Mando with a scuffed-up Jedi in a standstill, he found out exactly why. Kriffing Force Osik. And Boba had been content not seeing another Jedi till the end of his days.
The armour was certainly starting to cost him a lot, on patience required at least.
*-*
For Fennec Shand, the day was going fantastically.
It was always a treat to watch others trip and bluster their way through life while you were standing a safe distance away. That was what being an assassin sniper mostly was, after all.
Fennec was just fine and happy. She couldn’t say the same about these idiots, though. The vein on Boba’s neck throbbed threateningly, after all. And the Mando dad seemed like he was a wrong answer away from attempted homicide. The robed man was certainly not fine, what with walking around half dead and looking like it.
Now if only she had a nice drink to sip on and someone to gossip with about the idiots in her life and their never-ending drama, this would be simply perfect.
And she didn’t have to pay a credit for it.
*-* ¤-¤ *-*
How did it continue then, one might ask. Like everything in life did, a mess of happy, chaotic and sad.
Jon had a feeling this conversation wasn’t going as well as it should.
It wasn’t surprising, given what kind of day he was having.
First, he’d been so close to Death travelling forward 31 years had felt like an easy feat while simultaneously healing his massive burn scars completely and without feeling the familiar pain of it, which left him baffled if he thought about it. Then he’d fought some quite accomplished mechanical soldiers in defence of the youngling who had been the source of the call he’d answered. Then he’d found out about the time travelling and the massacre of the Jedi that had happened whilst he was as good as dead. Now there was no one else but him and this youngling who needed guidance.
Jon had never wanted a padawan.
He wouldn’t take on a padawan.
He refused to be like Dark Woman to this far too precious child. He would need to sleep and meditate and perhaps have a long while in the ‘fresher and eat something - but he couldn’t do any of that, couldn’t have a mental breakdown, couldn’t weep for the souls lost, the customs and the good that could have been done.
Jon could finish this conversation with the protectively angry Mandalorian dad.
“Firstly, I have nowhere to take him”, he said, calmly, or as calmly as he could while still visibly grieving everything, “I have nothing in this time. The child and the Force guided me here from the past. Secondly, Grogu is very clear on not leaving you and the Jedi are no child snatchers. If you would have it so, I could follow you for now. I usually follow the will of the Force. I’m certain we can come to a compromise after we’ve rested. And thirdly… My master was someone I would never be similar to willingly. I would require your help in being a good teacher for Grogu. I don’t trust to know the best for him, so a parent’s help in his upbringing would benefit us all, I believe.”
The Mandalorian didn’t want to skewer him anymore, Jon thought with some humour. Now he just wanted to sleep in a safe place, which Jon could completely agree with. Alas, it was not meant to be. Two other people followed the first Mandalorian into the room, the first having a more colourful set of Mandalorian armour on and the other carrying a rifle and looking out for threats. They stopped by the other Mando, and Jon felt no immediate danger from them.
“The ship’s clear then?” the green Mando asked gruffly, getting a nod in return, “What are you going to do with it?”
The question seemed to throw them all for a loop.
“Sell it?” the woman asked after a long while they spent feeling overwhelmed.
“Not to imps”, the silver Mando rasped out vehemently, “I think Bo-Katan would want to buy it.”
After that, it was a short negotiation on flying the ship to somewhere more remote, root out the last ‘imps’ and then they found themselves aboard the silver Razor Crest Jon had aimed that one missile away from earlier. He might have said this aloud when seeing the ship, since it had been an eventful moment and he’d been hanging from a black trooper at the time so hadn’t really noticed it at the time properly.
“Why would you do that? You didn’t even know it was mine at the time?” the silver Mando asked.
Jon simply smiled at his helmeted head, “It felt like the right thing to do. The Force willed it and so I acted.”
To him, it was that simple. It always was.
“Thank you, anyways”, the silver Mando said quietly, marching his way inside the ship, the child peering over his shoulder at Jon curiously. They hadn’t had a moment to meet each other in peace until now, after all, and now they all had other necessities to take care of. The Mando showed him to the small refresher and its sleek appliances. Jon stopped in front of the first reflective surface and had to stare at himself. This… was the worst he had ever looked. Even that time covered in mud and blood he had looked better. This time he looked more corpse-like than ever.
Thankfully the shower was a sonic, which meant it would do all the work for him. He didn’t have enough energy to raise his hands up to do something about his hair, which was… on top of his head. Stripping and stepping in, he sighed as the sonic washed him of the soot and ash and halfway melted fabric. How he still had his lightsaber, Jon didn’t know. The clothes didn’t look any better clean, but he donned them on anyway, walking out with one hand holding his body upright by the wall.
The Mando was waiting for him, a couple of ration bars in his hand alongside a water bottle. Jon took both with a quiet “thank you”. Then he was shown to the simple sleep pallet, and he slept, like the dead person he should have been, if not for the youngling calling for him. Sleep was simple in his bone deep fatigue. The problems would begin later when he was good enough to dream. Jon didn’t want to dream. Fay was gone, he knew. Everyone he’d ever known was most likely gone.
¤-¤
Din watched the Jedi fall asleep on the pallet.
He felt tired and was slowly winding down from the adrenaline rush of the day. He settled Grogu on the hanging mat above the Jedi and settled himself on some soft clothing sacks to sleep. The Jedi had his usual sleeping place, but Din felt like this was the least he could do for the man after everything he’d done for them. He could still hardly believe the man was ready to follow him around and teach Grogu with his input.
It sounded like an impossible dream.
Everything he’d learnt from the Jedi said they were space wizards who liked to stay with others like them or alone. He’d been ready to give Grogu to them and potentially never see him again. He would try, he knew, but he… he would try his hardest to meet Grogu again. But now, suddenly, he didn’t need to let him go at all.
This Jedi was Manda’s gift to him, simple as that, Din knew. Grogu was safe, they were relatively safe in hyperspace and Fett and Shand promised to keep watch while they slept. Din knew they must have both looked terrible for them to force them to sleep and not take a watch. He trusted them to do this. Fett had followed him without a promise to tie him to it and Shand seemed to follow his lead in most everything Din had seen until now. It would be alright to close his eyes and let the relief wash over him as sleep took over. Dank farrik did he need it, too.
It wouldn’t be until a day later that they would manage to contact Kryze and have her freeze in place before starting to screech in rage at Din having the black Jedi sword.
What her problem was, Din didn’t know.
Nor did he care, honestly.
It wasn’t his problem.
(Oh, but it was, he was to find out to his own consternation. Who knew you could accidentally become a sole ruler of a mostly dead planet? It didn’t help matters that Jon was nodding along, face that oddly serene mask whenever he was listening to the will of the Force and Grogu was giggling and clapping his hands, yearning for a new adventure on their own planet. If Din knew anything, it was that he wouldn’t be the kind of ruler to sit around. Besides, they would need a ton of credits to do anything. He better call Karga about some jobs to take…)