indebted. [din djarin x reader]

bargain.

Karga gives you a break from secretary work the next day, apparently realizing that yesterday's workload was too much for a beginner. He sends you to pick up groceries instead, shoving a handful of credits into your hand and telling you to "buy whatever you know how to cook." Then he returns to work which seems as bad as it did yesterday.

There's something about the liberty that the Nevarro marketplace affords you that puts a spring in your step. It's hot and crowded and people are shouting from every direction for every reason. It's loud, and you hate the noise. But you're effectively by yourself. No one is lording over you. You've got a handful of credits to spend on whatever you like. If this was your job every day, you could get used to it. Twenty years wouldn't be so bad.

But it would still be twenty years.

Maker, you need to figure out how to convince Mando to take another puck. Just one more. If he's as good a hunter as Karga makes him out to be, how much would it hurt? But you sincerely doubt you'll be able to convince him by asking "why not." There's little else you can use to convince him, as the man at the bar made abundantly clear yesterday. Not that you would necessarily offer that. You're going to have to pray that, when the moment comes, you'll know what to do.

It's little more than a half-hour later when that prayer is put to the test. At an intersection of streets, the glint of the sun off a beskar helmet catches your eye, and you see Mando march across the marketplace with a satchel slung over his shoulder. You're chasing after him before you know what you're doing. Your head is swimming again, this time with the idea of a year of freedom you wouldn't otherwise have.

You can't run; the streets are too crowded for that, and Mando wouldn't respond well to that, anyway. Besides, the idea of approaching him and immediately engaging in a conversation is making your step falter as you get closer and closer.

He's bartering with a vendor in a language you don't understand, and you just hover in the background, trying to map out your plan, pretending to be involved in your surroundings. Every step you take closer to him is another time you have to remind your heart to keep beating. Maker, you've never been so disoriented before, and it scares you to death.

Still, you persist. When he moves to a different stall, you move too, giving him space to get ahead first. You're still racking your brain for what the kriff you say to whatever the kriff a Mandalorian is. If you knew anything about him at all, this might be easier. Maybe you should just observe for now.

He goes under a tent that takes up three stall spaces, and you follow him there a few moments later. It's an artisan's tent; shards of stained glass in every shape you can think of hang from the posts of the tent, shining in the sunlight and casting rainbows of color onto the dusty ground below. It's the most color you've seen in years, and it nearly distracts you from your task.

There's a mobile with shards of deep blues and purples in abstract shapes lined with silver along the edges that catches your eye. You haven't seen anything quite so vivid in years. Almost without thinking about it, you reach for it. Your fingertips barely brush against the smooth surface--

"Are you done following me?" a voice from behind you asks.

Mando's sudden attention hits you like a punch in the stomach, and you drop your hand to the side. He's no more than a couple of feet behind you, and you hadn't even noticed he moved at all. You suppose you should've known better than to try following a bounty hunter without being noticed. "I—" you start, as you spin around. "I wanted to apologize. For yesterday, I mean..."

Mando doesn't shift an inch. "It was Karga's fault. He should know better."

Great start. "He wasn't trying to be rude," you tell him. You're still aiming for an apologetic tone, but it comes out defensive. You need to rethink your strategy. What you need is a lie. Well, no, not a lie exactly. Just a different way to frame the truth. "I wasn't even supposed to meet you at all, but I pestered him about it. It was all my fault. If there's any way I can make it up to you...?"