Author's Note
I meant to post this over the weekend. And then I struggled with continuity and my muse forced me to stop to create a timeline for known Star Wars events, the likely placement of Mandalorian events (like when Din was born and when he was saved by Mandalorians), and where Mahin's own timeline falls in place with everything. It...took a while. But I know I'm better off for it.
This chapter answers the obvious question that everyone keeps asking: Is Mahin Force-sensitive?
I have my own question for you, though: What do you call a padawan who never completed her training?
Go onward and enjoy!
Carving Out a Place Pt. 2
Mahin looks around the Razor Crest after Mando leaves, kid propped on her hip and not really sure what to do. She was brought on as a mechanic and caregiver, but they never really went over what all that entails. Does she clean the ship? Do laundry? Cook meals? Or does she leave everything alone for Mando to take care of if it has nothing to do with fixing the ship or directly taking care of the kid?
Mando seems to keep a tidy ship. Really almost a necessity for a ship this small. Neat stacks of crates line the left side of the hold across from the carbonite freezer. Three slabs of bounties hang from a rack like clothes in a closet, the faces of bounties in various states of fear or anger or pain frozen in carbonite.
She steers clear of those. She has nothing against bounty hunting or anything, but the thought of being frozen like that, unmoving and unaware and totally without control, kind of freaks her out.
She finds a few compartments built into the walls further down the hold, opening up with the press of a button. Laundry and sink that pull from the water recycler, a stove top that doesn't get used since she found a crate filled with ration packets, the weapons locker, a slab of metal she assumes is the medical bay, and a few cubbies for storage. Then Mando's sleeping compartment and refresher on the back wall, and on the right between the corner and weapons locker is a storage closet filled with additional crates. They look like a combination of medical and weapon supplies, both highly necessary in the bounty hunting trade. Upstairs has only the cockpit, access to the hyperdrive and the ship's main engine.
Not a whole lot, but enough for one man. However, it's now one man, one woman, and a child.
How do they make this work?
The kid has a hammock as a bed, which he seems to enjoy, but she finds no signs of toys other than the silver lever handle. She gets that Mando doesn't mean to keep the kid, but he's still going to need more than this.
He may be such a handful because he doesn't have any toys to occupy his time.
A sharp pang shoots through Mahin's chest. Is that another reason why the kid is still developmentally a baby, despite having lived for fifty years? Toys are an important form of enrichment. They help kids learn about the world around them, how things work, how their own bodies move, and about language.
Really, no one has taken proper care of this child before Mando came along. She's not sure how she knows that for certain, but she does.
And she wants to do all that she can to help, too.
Mahin scrounges through the crates, trying not to feel like a creep snooping through Mando's stuff but needing to know what she has to work with. She finds one crate filled with tools and spare parts and lets out a small noise of delight. She picks through it all. Wires, piping, tubing, screws, random metal bits. A beat-up toolbox lays at the bottom. Tugging it out, she throws a couple things in and then works on getting it all and the kid up to the cockpit.
It takes two trips, but she eventually gets the kid in one of the passenger seats and the toolbox on the floor next to her feet as she sits in the pilot's chair. The kid holds out a hand with grabby fingers. She chuckles lightly, unscrewing the ball from the lever to hand it to him.
"Don't worry, ad'ika," she tells him affectionately. "We'll get you something better soon."
With the kid occupied, she turns towards the control panels. She can't work on the outside of the ship and she has no desire to go crawling around ducts again today. She has to keep an eye on the kid anyway. So, a full diagnostics check of the ship's systems will have to do for now.
She gets the system booted up, grabbing the old datapad from the toolbox and hooking it up to a port in the dash. A few quick taps and a progress bar appears on the screen as the diagnostics scan begins. With that going, she selects a few bobs and ends from the toolbox, along with a screwdriver, and starts tinkering.
It's quiet for the first ten minutes with only the sounds of Mahin's tinkering and the beeping of the datapad. Then she hears a soft thump. She doesn't look up at first, focusing on connecting caps to a piece of pipe in order to cover the sharp edges.
Then she hears the tinkle of metal against metal near her feet.
Without missing a beat, her hand reaches out and snatches the back of the kid's coat before he can stick a wire in his mouth. He lets out an indignant squawk as she takes the wire from his hands to return to the toolbox.
"No, no, ad'ika," she gently scolds as she returns him to his seat. "Those aren't for playing. Or eating. Or teething. You just sit there and play with your ball. I promise we'll get you new toys soon."
Yeah, he definitely needs new toys.
The morning ticks by steadily, interrupted only by a call from Mando on the commlink informing her that he's taken a local bounty and will be a few more hours. Mahin wishes him luck and keeps working on her little creation in between keeping the kid out of trouble and checking the progress of the diagnostics scan.
The kid definitely doesn't like to sit still. She's not sure how Mando managed it by himself before, but it's a routine Mahin's used to. She used to offer to watch the kids of families who came through the shipyard, keeping an eye on babies, children, and everything in between while parents took care of business in town. She would work on the ships while watching them in her periphery, always having a sense of when little feet or hands started wandering where they shouldn't.
Mahin catches the kid from trying to touch buttons on the control panel three times, trying to climb down the ladder two times, and attempting to get into the toolbox again seven times. Each time she catches him before he can do anything dangerous, like fall through the hatch to the lower level. He's so small, she's pretty sure he's not even capable of climbing down a ladder, no matter how good his little legs seem to be at walking.
Mahin sighs deeply as she catches the kid, again. He's definitely more squirrely than any of the previous kids she's looked after. Definitely good at escape.
A part of her wonders if that wasn't developed from necessity.
She shakes those thoughts away, putting the finishing touches on the project in her hands. No use thinking those thoughts. No matter what the kid's been through, he's safe now and they're committed to making sure he stays safe. That's all that matters.
"Here you go, ad'ika," she says, holding out the makeshift rattle to him. His eyes go even bigger, if possible. The little ball slips from his fingers to roll across the floor completely forgotten. Mahin grins as she hands him the new toy. It's nothing much, just some nuts and shiny baubles of metal attached to a bit of pipe with wire, any potential pokey bits covered with electrical tape.
But it makes a satisfying rattling noise when shaken, which the child wastes no time in finding out. A sound that could potentially get very annoying now that she thinks about it, but the delighted squeal he emits melts her heart so much she just can't find it in her to care.
It's sure to melt hearts wrapped in beskar, too.
A beep from the datapad announces the completed scan and Mahin turns her attention to it, going over the information without worry that the child will get into trouble again anytime soon as he plays with his new toy.
She works in almost-silence, enjoying the low hum the ship always seems to make, never allowing for true quiet. It's different than the hum of the city. The metal walls are thick enough to block out voices of any passerby. No stomping of feet from the floor above her or raucous laughter of the bar patrons below.
Different, but a good different.
Something else presses at the back of her mind, though, her senses picking something up that she can't quite place. It bothers her enough to make her pause in her reading. She doesn't hear anything over the hum. Nothing coming from outside. No funny smells, no one standing ominously outside the ship that she can see through the viewport.
But she swears she…feels something. Almost familiar and yet not. She concentrates on the feeling, trying to remember a context for when she last felt something like this, and then it hits her.
She's feeling something…not with any of her normal senses.
She feels something in the Force.
The datapad falls to the dash with a jarring clank, her spine going ramrod straight. Her brow furrows, focusing on the feeling in the back of her mind with senses she hasn't actively used in years. Someone reaches out to her through the Force, trying to connect to her.
Another Force user.
It's not something she uses often, the Force. She has to be careful. No one can see her using her abilities. No one can know for fear of it getting back to the Empire somehow. Besides, she never finished her training. She's a padawan without a Jedi master anymore, leaving her skills raw and energy levels low.
But it's surprisingly easy to fall back into. The Force greets her like a long-lost friend. The warmth of it surrounds her. Soothing. Comforting. She follows her connection to it back to the one who reaches out for her, sensing curiosity, excitement, and an innocent delight that can only come from one place.
Slowly, she turns in her seat to face the child.
"Holy kriffing crap," she whispers out, eyes going wider than the child's as she stares at the little green gean, so small, so innocent. But a talented Force user from what she can feel.
So much makes sense now. How he can be fifty years old and still look so young, for starters. She remembers learning of a Jedi named Yoda during her training. She even saw a few pictures of him that survived Order 66, looking just like this little one in front of her. Even though she never got to meet him, she felt the day Yoda died in the Force. And he was over nine hundred years old.
She also understands why the Empire wants this child. And yet, she really doesn't. Imperial orders for Force users are supposed to be shoot on sight.
So why seek to take the kid? Why not simply kill him?
Mahin's blood runs cold, goosebumps scattering down her arms. That Stormtrooper who found her, he didn't try to kill her, either. He tried to bring her in.
Why would the Empire suddenly want to keep them?
Then she remembers how Mando said something about experimentation.
Experimentation on Force users. Why? To make Jedi of their own? To make their Stormtroopers capable of using the Force?
Or something far more sinister?
Warmth envelopes her, the child's Force presence wrapping around her like the softest blanket, pulling her out of her spiraling thoughts. Instinctively, Mahin reaches back, touching their Force presences together, their lights, their darks, their souls.
The child's delight strengthens with an echoing coo. Happy to find another like him.
She bends over in her seat to pick up the forgotten silver ball, holding it out to him on the flat of her palm. He's smart, picking up right away what she wants him to do. Closing his eyes, he holds out a hand as he uses the Force. The little ball levitates smoothly out of her hand and over to his. The ball never shakes, never dips or deviates, until his three fingers wrap around it.
He's strong. Really strong. He got training before the fall of the Jedi Order.
He holds the ball back out to her, cooing imploringly.
It's easy. Surprisingly easy despite the last time she did this was five, six years ago. She dropped a screwdriver in the middle of an engine and the only other way to get it out would have been to take the engine apart. She doesn't even have to close her eyes to concentrate like the kid. She feels for the Force around the ball and it answers, zipping the ball seamlessly back to her hand like a magnet.
The kid claps excitedly with a high-pitched squeal.
"Yeah, ad'ika," she says softly, picking him up to cradle him against her chest. He goes eagerly, nuzzling his face against her collarbone exposed by the neckline of her tank top. "I'm like you."
His presence surges, the Force bubbling up in him like a fountain.
Mahin abruptly pulls back, grasping both of his hands in one of hers to make him stop. "No, ad'ika," she tells him firmly with a quiver to her voice. He pauses. Presence confused and a little hurt, but mostly confused as to why she would pull back from using the Force, something he feels is so much part of himself.
She swallows thickly around a tight throat. She feels that way, too. That the Force is a part of her. Really, it's a part of everything. It weaves the universe together like threads in a tapestry. But the universe doesn't feel the Force like she does. Like the kid does. Only people like them can pull at the threads of the Force, to use it, manipulate it, make it answer their call.
But Force-sensitives can't just use the Force at birth. They have a seed planted in their souls. A seed that needs water—training—in order to grow. Without that, the seed will wither and die, any knowledge in the Force forgotten.
Mahin hasn't actively trained in over a decade. And yet her knowledge of the Force never wanes. In fact, it feels like just the slightest push, the slightest practice, will make her powers grow and grow.
It terrifies her. If she gets better, stronger, the Empire will only want to seek her out more and more. Especially in its weakened state.
They fear anything with more power than them.
"I can't, ad'ika," she tries to explain, letting him feel her tremor of fear. She's not sure how much he understands, but she does know he understands one thing. "I…I don't want the bad men to get me."
His ears droop, echoes of foggy memories drifting along his consciousness that she picks up. Men in white coats and dark faces, poking him with needles and machines and pain. So much pain.
So much more than a child should know.
"I don't want that to happen to me. I don't want the Stormtroopers to get me."
She never really voiced that aloud before. It's why she's been running all this time, it influences every decision she ever makes, but she never gave it words. Substance. Bringing the idea into reality like this feels dangerous. As if it can conjure the Stormtroopers right at her heels.
But it doesn't. She's safe on the Mandalorian's ship and it makes saying the words easier.
"I'm sorry I…can't be that for you." A peer, a teacher, a fellow Force user. Someone to share this with. She can feel his yearning for it, but she can't. Fear squeezes her chest like a vice. She was taught that fear can lead to the Dark Side of the Force but fear is what keeps her from using the Force at all.
Maybe that makes it better somehow. All she knows for sure is that it's better this way.
"I can't use the Force," she says again, lowering her face to his so he looks her straight in the eye. "I can't. It's too dangerous. And Mando can't ever know, alright? This has to stay between us."
The kid babbles sadly but she swears he nods, accompanied by acceptance before his Force presence retreats fully from her. Instantly, she misses him, but this is for the best.
It's for the best.
She presses a kiss to the top of his head, mumbling against the sparse hairs, "But we can still be friends, right?"
His delighted squeal may become her new favorite sound.
Mahin goes back to the diagnostics results, the kid now nestled in her lap with his rattle. Both of them needing the nearness after what they discovered.
The ship's systems seem to be working surprisingly well. The scan only points out a sluggish nav system and a possible hiccup in the hyperdrive. She can write a simple software patch for the nav system in a few hours. The hyperdrive, however, may be a little worrying, potentially making them miss their destination by a couple planets if it gets worse. She needs to take a look through the machinery to find the root of the problem.
And she'll need better tools than what Mando has on hand to do it.
Mahin furrows her brow at the datapad for a moment before opening up a blank page to take notes. She keeps thinking of things they need to buy, too many things. Way, way too many things that Mando may not agree with, but she can at least make a list.
Sometime later, the whirr of the rear ramp lowering catches Mahin's attention, the child babbling happily as he recognizes that Mando's made it back. Multiple voices filter up from below, though, voices she doesn't recognize.
She stills, suddenly uncertain.
Setting the child down on one of the passenger seats, Mahin cautiously approaches the top of the ladder. She peeks over the side of the hatch to the lower level.
Mando already looks up at her from the bottom.
Tension eases from her shoulders. She…might be a little on edge still after last night, she realizes.
"They're just here to pick up the bounties," he says softly to her unasked question. "They'll be gone in a few minutes."
She nods, feeling the need to stay quiet and out of sight. She slides to the floor next to the hatch with her back against the wall. Mando leans against the wall as well below her, facing the rest of the cargo hold to watch the guild workers while staying in her line of sight.
Gratefulness suddenly floods through Mahin as she waits. Gratefulness that she ended up here, that she didn't end up starting over alone again. She remembers the last time she had a close call like this, about five years before the fall of the Empire. She was terrified of everything and everyone she came in contact with, the paranoia making it almost impossible to sleep at night. To trust that every person next to her didn't hold a puck with her face in it.
A bit of that terror resurfaces now, sour on her tongue and turning her stomach, but it feels more manageable with Mando near. Knowing he searches for threats, too, and more than capable of handling them.
When the voices fade off into the distance with their bounties frozen in carbonite, Mando presses a button on his left vambrace to close the rear ramp and then climbs up the ladder. She gets up, backing away to pick up the child and sit down in a passenger seat with him in her lap.
"I see you two are getting along well," Mando comments, running a hand along the child's ear in greeting on his way by to sit in the pilot's seat.
Mahin suppresses a smirk. He has no idea. "He was an absolute angel."
"You mean to say that he behaves for you but for me he's worse than a rampaging bantha?"
"I never said he didn't try to get into stuff." The smirk pushes through, lips spreading across her cheeks. "But it was nothing I couldn't handle."
Mando lets out a huff that might be a laugh. He leans forward, flicking a finger against the kid's makeshift toy. "This have something to do with it?"
"A little." Taking the opening, she hands him the datapad to look over. "He needs more than spare parts, though. And we need more stuff in general if I'm going to keep this ship flying."
She lays out her plans, for getting the kid more toys that are just as important for child development as they are for keeping the little one occupied, what tools they need to take care of the hyperdrive and any future problems, and some food that she wants to get—real food that wasn't fabricated in some factory.
Mando scrolls through her list without saying a word and stays silent for several minutes after she stops talking. Mahin twists the fabric of the child's cloak in her fingers, anxiously waiting and hoping she didn't unknowingly overstep her bounds. They haven't really talked about what those are yet, she reminds herself again.
But if he wants her to take care of the kid and the ship, then they need these things.
"Most of this will be easy," he finally states, giving the datapad back to her. "The market here should have it all. The food, however, will have to wait, at least a little. Half ration packs, half fresh food to start. It'll get expensive in the long run. The only way to keep it up will be if you take on work at the ports, if you were serious about your offer."
"I was," she agrees hastily, starting to bounce in her seat with giddiness, which makes the child giggle. He likes her ideas. She can be useful to him.
"I also have a condition."
Her brow furrows seriously, nodding at him to go on. Whatever it is, she's sure she can handle it.
"You get stuff for yourself before worrying too much about the rest of this."
"But this is the stuff I need to get."
"Mahin." He leans forward, elbows on his thighs and looking at her with an intensity that burns despite the helmet. "You left home with only the clothes on your back. You need more clothes and things for yourself. You take care of yourself first. The rest can wait." He goes for his belt, pulling out a handful of credits, taking her hand, and pressing the money into her palm. "This is your share."
She balks, trying to pull her hand back without talking the money, but his fingers curl around her wrist to gently hold her there. Well, this feels really familiar. "I wasn't even here for those bounties you collected."
"Doesn't matter. This was the deal. You get a cut of my pay. Use it to help get you back on your feet. We'll eat some lunch and then go to the market for whatever you need."
He waits for her fingers to curl around the credits before letting her go, getting up to head back down in search of some food for them. Mahin stares after him, an odd weight settling on her chest. He's…different. She knows Mandalorians have a Creed, a code of honor. Promises mean a lot to them. Honesty. Integrity.
Trust doesn't come easy, though. Yet he works hard to integrate Mahin into his life. Harder than she thought he would.
And she really wants to integrate herself into his life, too, and the child's. She'll do whatever's needed to carve out a place here and keep it.
Author's Note
Seriously, guys, what does this make Mahin? Is she still considered Force-sensitive? More than that? A padawan still, even though she has no plans to complete her training? Is there a name for this?
I was always under the impression that Force-sensitives don't really know they can use the Force until someone shows them how. It's not like those stories where people just randomly start developing superpowers. Luke never would have started levitating things until he got training. Without Obi-Wan and Yoda, he probably would have been relatively normal his entire life. So I wanted Mahin to have abilities, just not be all that strong yet, kind of like Grogu.
However, I also got the impression that Force abilities can be forgotten with time. That's how Ashoka made it sound when she refused to train Grogu. She thought it too dangerous and said that, so long as he held an attachment to Din, it would be better for him to not get more training and allow his powers to fade.
But Mahin is different for reasons. There's still some stuff I gotta hold close to the vest. ;)
Next chapter, we get more Din. And we get more of Mahin's thoughts on his beliefs as a Mandalorian and the beginnings of the route I wish them to take.
Hope you enjoyed, PLEASE REVIEW, and see you all next time!
Translations
ad'ika (little one)
