Lullaby | The Mandalorian

Chapter Eleven: ARe yoU FRieNDs WiTh hER!?

Warning: This chapter is very mature.

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Mando did not know how long they laid on the floor.

Long enough for his arm to go numb...To look at Annelise and know she was sleeping despite the blindfold she still wore over her eyes. The lights from hyperspace reflected off her face, the only light in the dim cockpit besides the glowing hue of the controls. He had slipped off the armor to lay closer to her, just to think – she had stopped talking eventually – had slipped off but he could not sleep, dwelling far too much on what had transpired. What had happened – was this – a shit show. And he should not have made the decisions he made but the –

The Creed was a Creed.

He had killed the kid's parent, the village was – burned to the ground because of them. And well, Grogu and the Jedi didn't work out. And now this wasn't going to work out either. Grogu was a Jedi, but this kid was just a kid – just as Mando had been a kid without power, without the ability to choke the life out of a threat. That in itself was unnerving. At least Mando was able to be brought to the tribe. Underground. He didn't know what to do with yet another person – and he had Annelise now too...Who took much of the burden of fucking childrearing, but he wanted to keep her alive for fuck's sake.

Away from her father and hunters.

Mando looked at her face again. The soft curve of her throat.

Maker, she had felt so good.

He had not hesitated when she had said it, and maybe that was wrong, considering the...circumstances. The way he had asked her before – asked to fuck her. Asked to have her. To take her. Every fucking piece of her, and he ran his palm along her arm where she was sleeping beside him. He knew this was bordering on something dangerous, an unhealthy need and wanting.

He knew it was the darker corners of his mind. The things that made him overbearing, like the way he protected Grogu – and obsessed over keeping him safe, and now her – her – he just thought about her so much, and the sounds she had made. The way her soft hands had touched him, in a way he did not deserve, as if he would shatter her just from gentle hands – he was glass. Made of shards almost. But he wanted her – wanted to keep her.

She was not safe.

Especially not now.

Maybe she had woken from his touch, but she whispered – her voice sounding shaky as she spoke behind the blindfold, "Do you think they're okay?"

"Who?" Mando questioned, tone rough from his chest and disuse for hours.

"Grogu and the – the um...boy."

Mando blinked, then said, "I haven't heard crying."

Grogu could scream his head off when he wanted. He had learned that after leaving him alone one too many times. The other kid – well, he hadn't spoken. Mando hadn't spoken for a long time after his mother and father had been murdered. Most of the other children in the tribe talked enough for him. He didn't need to. It was probably best the kid didn't ask questions now anyway, and he was even younger than Mando had been...Mando saw Annelise nod stiffly, and he pressed his fingers into her upper arm...Then slid down to her ribs on her back under her shirt and –

Annelise whispered, "We had sex."

Mando blinked, then, "Yes."

Because what else was he meant to say? She sounded in disbelief, but it had been a very real moment in his thought process, and he had known precisely what he was doing and what he had wanted, whereas she seemed confused with their actions. Maybe that made him feel like shit. But he had been the one who had told her it was wrong, and he pressed his lips to the back of her head, in an attempt to reconcile what might have been a mistake on his part. But he didn't apologize.