Bounty hunting is a complicated profession

Old partners

It had been a couple of hours since you hid inside Mando's sleeping quarters. The ship had landed shortly after and you had been hearing a lot of noise coming from outside. Not only that of footsteps of very different people — judging by the sounds — but also of cargo boxes coming and leaving.

Suddenly, the ship took off. You had assumed you were going to a specific destination where Mando would join these "people" on a mission, but since you could tell it wasn't just the two of you in the ship, you guessed the mission somehow included the ship. Judging by Mando's mood, he hadn't anticipated that either.

Purely out of curiosity, you sharpened your ears to try and hear these people as well as you focused on what you could feel about them. Mando was in the cockpit and there were three people down there with you: one seemed to be angry while the others were more relaxed, focused. They were also talking quietly, but you couldn't make out what they were saying.

After a while of nothing happening, you started to lose interest in them and turned back to your book, only to realise a few moments later that you hadn't taken into account how you were supposed to go to the bathroom if the ship was crowded with people who weren't supposed to know you were there. Well, since you could tell if someone was there or not, maybe, after you landed, you could risk an excursion.

You were strategising your future trip to the bathroom when Mando came downstairs. He was upset about something. The noise of a door closing and voices rising reached you, as well as the feeling of the angry guy getting riled up. Luckily, one of the other two seemed to intervene in a much calmer tone and managed to diffuse the tension a little bit.

Unfortunately, it didn't last long.

Someone said something that gave way to a burst of laughter in which Mando did not participate. You sharpened your ears again, trying to get what they were saying. A female voice talked but you didn't quite get what she said, only how she said it, with a cruel tone and malicious intent. Whatever it was that she said, it made Mando uncomfortable and seemed to fill him with guilt and resentment.

You got closer to the door after hearing something about a helmet followed by more laughter.

"You ever seen his face?" A male voice said.

"A lady never tells." You heard the female voice answer in a way that left little to the imagination. An unpleasant feeling welled in your chest as you started to hear a thumping noise in your ears.

"Aw. Come on, Mando. We all gotta trust each other here." the man said insistently "Just lift the helmet up. Come on. Let's all see your eyes."

At that point you had to admit you were amazed with Mando's self-restraint, you could feel his blood boiling and yet he was saying nothing. You two must really be in need of the money, you thought.

"I'll do it!"

Then, the sound of a fight breaking reached you. Something or someone hit the compartment door hard and when the fight seemed to be over, the door suddenly slid open, exposing you to all the inhabitants of the ship.

For a moment, you all looked at each other without saying anything. Closest to you was the man who had been mocking Mando, behind him was a female Twi'lek, and the third man — the angry one — you couldn't see, but you knew he was around the corner.

"Whoa! What is that?" the man asked, surprised. "You get lonely here Mando? Got yourself some company?" He chuckled.

"Yeah. Something like that." Mando answered and you had to use all your self-restraint not to raise an eyebrow at him in disbelief.

The angry man had finally come out from behind the corner and you saw that he wasn't a man, he was a Devaronian with red skin and even taller than Mando.