41 BBY – Mandalore
The air was dry in the ship, his fingers tired and aching from the manual work, the tiny pieces of tubing and packaging for the illicit substances threatened to fall between his fingers as they shook. His body was constantly run by small tremors, thanks to the endless exposure to the spice; it peppered the rancid recycled air, and with every breath he unwillingly inhaled a little more into his system.
Shocking volts would course through his body at the slightest perceived wrongdoing from his captors. The only thing keeping him from collapsing was his will made of pure beskar. The owners whipped and threatened; the owned would lower their heads in submission.
But he could handle that. He could handle all of that: the rancid air, the incessant tremors, the torturous shocks and the ever-present fatigue. All of it, it fuelled him with ire and the dulcet dreams of bloody revenge.
But even thoughts of revenge couldn't change the fact that he was tired, always drop-dead tired, the kind of weariness that gnarled at the bones and settled there. He endured though, he's Mandalorian, his father Jaster Mereel was the Mand'alor, he had taught Jango all about endurance and his death at the hands of betreyal even more so. All of their deaths had taught him to endure. He knew how to handle the pain and the exhaustion that came afterward.
He slept on the cold floor amongst the assortment of bodies, poor enslaved souls barely alive anymore, barely anything left within them that resembled sentient beings. They were more like droids on the last dregs of life now, just going through the motions day in and day out. Until death came that is.
He swallowed and the collar around his throat prophesied strangulation.
But he could handle it, he's Mandalorian, he's strong, he knew about endurance.
As he closed his eyes a tear trailed a wet path down his cheek. The smell of spice filled Jango's nostrils a well known friend; it is with that flavor that weary sleep dragged him under into nothingness.
·~·~·~·
Jango doesn't wake up with a start, he's better than that. He's got years of training and experience dealing with all manner of precarious situations under his belt that have long since beaten the reflex out of him. His eyes open slowly as he takes in a deep inhale of stale air; it's been a while since he'd last docked and the filters, as good as they were, aren't magical. He places a hand over his breast and wills his racing heart to slow. There is no danger, he is alone, there's no one on the ship but him.
His vessel drifts through space with no set destination to guide it through the stars; quiet, infinitely silent, like the whole of the galaxy, lonesome and aimless. The Fury is a wretched thing but very functional, quite like its owner. It gets Jango safely where he needs to go, if there ever is such a place where he might head to, and it's not as small as one-man ships tend to be.
He sits up on his bed and takes in an even deeper breath, his heart is still racing, trying to get away from him in a mad dash. There won't be any more rest to be found tonight. Jango climbs out of bed. It's time to get to work.
·~·~·~·
The mere existence of Death Watch causes Jango to experience an instinctual level of disgust that's hard to suppress; setting foot upon the soil of their camp makes the deep set of his frown very noticeable - at least it would be if it weren't for his ever-present helmet. There's a vague part of him that wishes he could be anywhere else in the galaxy but here. Still, there are things to be done, and information to acquire. Besides he can't live in the dark forever, as much as that would please him.
The information he'd managed to shoot out of a guy about this place was minimal but useful. This particular small Kyr'tsad camp was laying low for a while because a couple of days ago they had been terrorizing villages and small towns some 50 klicks away. According to what he'd gathered from the drunkard at the bar, the leader of this camp had been working closely with one of Pre Vizsla's advisors not very long ago. Jango isn't in any position to infiltrate the more important or heavily armed bases across the Mandalore system, so he'll have to settle for the smaller fish and hope there is something of value to be found here.
The Fury is hidden some 10 klicks away, a distance Jango hopes is far enough to not attract any of the camp's attention, he's not here for a fight, he's not here to cause a scene, he needs information on Kry'tsad and their doings and that's it. It doesn't matter how much he burns on the inside at the thought of them, or how easy it would be to inflict some revenge on this group he's not even sure were instrumental to his downfall all those years ago. Death Watch, he has no pity for them, but he didn't come here to deliver justice of any kind.
The camp is half-hidden in a small indentation of the rocky plain, visible only if you know how to look for it, just another part of the terrain if you don't. As he creeps in closer Jango can hear the sounds of easy chatter and the crackling of fire; it sounds nice and comforting, like the nights he used to have with his own aliit, with Jaster. It makes him fume, to know that they can be content with themselves when they are responsible for Jango's slavery and barely human life, when he's the last of his family, when he's nothing but alone…
Jango sets his jaw and gets his head back where it belongs.
He slides down a rock into the concave earth and stills at the sound of steps coming his way, he ducks down low behind some sad bushes until the guards pass him by, they are none the wiser. Jango is as still as a corpse and nothing moves unless he wills it so.
He sighs quietly and moves towards the large tent that is to the utmost end of the camp, which serves as the command center for this specific group of Death Watch. A series of smaller tents are connected to this larger one and it's through one of these that Jango intends to sneak in. When he's absolutely sure there's no one inside and that the night watch won't catch sight of him he unlaces one of the folds of the tarp and passes through the fabric quickly and softly. Inside there are boxes, sacs, and all sorts of provisions, everything that the camp will need to live comfortably for a good long while. Jango smirks, he's sure Kyr'tsad wouldn't mind sharing a bit of the loot with an old friend, it'd be nice to have something new on The Fury now that rations bars are pretty much the only edible thing he has left, not that he tends to have much of anything else mind you. He allows himself half a second to inspect a small velvety bag atop one of the open metal boxes, he takes it in his hand and feels the numerous small contents inside moving around.
Jango stills. The sound of something brushing against dry grass is too close for comfort.
Not thinking at all, he pockets the bag in one of his many pouches and creeps forward. There's no more noise inside the tent and unless someone heard him, he doesn't think anyone would stand so silently. He activates the thermal vision in his helmet and scans the vicinity and holds his breath. There's a body half laid on the ground, slumped and limp, he suppresses the urge to huff in displeasure. A drunk if Jango has to take a guess, probably sneaked his way to the good stuff no doubt. He doesn't envy the poor sod when he's found out if what he knows of the leaders of the camp is anything to go by. He also doesn't really pity them, anyone belonging to this kriffed up group can choke on their consequences for all he cares.
Carefully, he moves forward and ventures a look at the body.
He stops.
Jango just… stops.
Cause right there, in a place no more suitable than for a farm animal, there's a young teen with a collar on his neck. A child for all he cares to admit.
That's a child.
Death Watch has a child tied up in their provision tent like cattle and treated even worse than if the marks on his body are anything to go by.
All thoughts of a quiet reconnaissance fly out of his head.
Jango is filled with rage.
It's a rage so hot it burns his insides from his belly outwards, spreading like wildfire in summer, it boils his blood and he cannot think. Because this boy, who looks barely out of his baby fat, whose half-starved and just like any other slave he's ever seen, like the ones who were with him on...
He… he doesn't know what to do. His mind is visited by visions of hollow faces, working fingers, the trembling of his own hands, and much less pleasant things.
No, he knows exactly what he should do, but for his own sake he shouldn't do it.
There's fire burning inside of him, uncontrollable and all-consuming. And Jango… Jango decides to deal with the issue.
·~·~·~·
The camp is quiet, but he's sure it won't be for much longer. Someone ought to have called for help before he could get to them. It's no matter, he can be gone from here before anyone was the wiser; but he has to be quick, a few moments of idleness will cost him his neck… and there's someone besides himself that he needs to get out of here as well.
He enters the big main tent from the front now, tall and proud like he is, striding amid still figures on the ground that are less than important, forever asleep on top of their cozy pools of blood. There are lounge-like spaces here and some desks, the operations department as he had suspected. To the right one of the connected sections leads to the dry grass and hay-covered ground of the storage tent for provisions and other oddities.
Jango shoves away the fabric at the entrance and stops at the sight before him. He lets out a heavy sigh at the now, very aware boy that is chained to his little animal pen of an abode. It's disgusting what people dare to do to children for some warped sense of enjoyment.
A pair of sharp blue-grey eyes, like an overcast day, look up at him from under long dirty brown locks of hair. For all intents and purposes, Jango does feel like he's staring at a wild animal, as repulsing as the thought may be; Kyr'tsad has made a number on the kid, there's no mistakeing that.
The teen is curled up as best as he can against the wood behind him, he hasn't got much strength on him by the looks of it and the Mandalorian isn't quite sure if he should waste his time on gentleness. Reinforcements will be here sooner or later and he'd like to put as much distance between himself and them as he can. He can tell there's no way this boy is going to follow him willingly in the very small amount of time he has to convince him that he's not a threat.
Jango sighs, Manda forgive him.
"Come on," he mumbles as he strides towards the boy, who flinches away from him as he kneels by his side. "Shh, it's okay, I won't hurt you."
He takes out a small detonator from one of his pockets and places it on the electrorope, it deactivates with a small flash and the cuff falls away from the teen's ankle. It's raw underneath, and what little skin is unblemished beneath is pale compared to the rest of the boy's complexion.
"Come." He orders once again, taking the teen by the arm and dragging him up.
It's at this moment when it dawns on the boy what's happening, the fear in his eyes grows as he tries to pull away from this new stranger who's taking him away to some unknown new suffering. From his mouth comes out pitiful sounds of protest and it breaks Jangos heart if just a little, but he hardens himself. Neither of them have time for gentleness, and he's not risking leaving the kid here to his fate of torture and death at the hands of Kyr'tsad; who'll definitely want to know what happened to the camp and how everyone ended up dead except him.
As he comes to the main part of the tent, dragging the kid behind him, he grabs a random datapad on a desk that he hopes contains a semblance of useful information. They walk out to the rocky exterior and the cold of the night, he guesses it's quite cold anyway. The teen is shivering in his grip, he's only wearing a thin raggedy shirt, as they stumble up the concave the camp hides in. Jango hears the scratch of nails on his armour as the boy continues to try and pry his arm from the man's grip. 'That's good,' he thinks 'there's still some fire left in him after all.'
More grunts of effort escape the kid's lips and that's when the sound of far away ships reaches him. Reinforcements.
"Kriff," Jango curses under his breath, they have to get out of here and fast, he closes his eyes for a second and gathers will. He tightens his grip on the teen's arm and turns around to face him, pulling him forward sharply.
"Listen kid, you want Kyr'tsad finding you after what I did there? Do you think your life will be any easier because you're not coming? Hm? What do you think will happen when they find all of their buddies dead and you're the only one alive? I can promise you, they'll be far less kind than me." he squeezes a little bit tighter for good measure.
The boy quiets with a soft frightened intake of air, he sees himself reflected in the visor of the Mandalorian helmet, the face of all of those who had wronged him, and swallows.
A moment pases, he lowers his eyes in submission, his hand falls from its efforts of dislodging Jango's grip from him and he goes as limb and placid as a droid with low batteries.
"Good choice." Mumbles Jango and pulls the kid behind him, this time without so much as a peep or a single tug of resistance. There's a little ache of guilt inside his chest but they must hurry, he pushes them as fast as he thinks the stumbling weak boy can take.
They run through the deserted rocky terrain for an hour and a half, by then the brunet teen is barely holding himself upright, but there on his arm is the constant anchor that holds him up; his new bond of captivity.
Abril: I'd like to thank all of you for the lovely reception the prologue had, it's super encouraging and it makes my heart all gooey. I really appreciate it.
I'll… make an effort to not take so long to post the next chapter, as I said before, the story is like 90% written, but need a lot of revision and I want it to be perfect (but I've not worked on it honestly):
Hope you guys liked the chapter!
Btw, would anyone like me to these the name of the next chapters at the endnotes?