Madlands

30. Outcast

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Mando eased the Razor Crest to a halt alongside the Sparrowhawk and lined-up their viewports for side-by-side visual contact.

It hadn't been the Crest's comms system that was down. Two days later, communications were still jammed, seemingly across the whole sector, with the Empire's propaganda about "needing to limit the spread of the Rangers' lies" the only message on any channel. There was no way to send out the proof that Grey had secured at the base.

Even in flight, all conversations after take-off were reduced to ship-to-ship hand signals or universal breaker-code pulses of light. Mandalorians had the advantage of a pre-existing language of silent gestures, used often during scouting, tracking, and military operations that demanded stealth. It was relatively basic, but did afford some nuance, and so far it had been enough.

He looked over at Rowan, who was at the port-side helm of the Sparrowhawk, a Gauntlet starfighter—mean and fast—that he'd rebuilt after the Clone Wars. He seemed to be finishing up a discussion with Paz, who was helm-starboard. Rowan then turned his visor towards the Crest and signalled a short series of hand movements, re-confirming their plan to do a slow, low-pass, full orbit of the planet before they would descend to their coordinates near the southern pole. Mando gestured back the affirmative, and waited for the starfighter to take the lead.

They were on a trade-scouting run to the dwarf planet Krynn. It was near enough to the Icarian sun that life was limited to the poles—its wide equatorial band intolerably hot. The three city-sized depots in the South acted as supply hubs for the system, moving everything from food to raw materials to fuel. Fuel distribution had, according to Rowan, become the sole focus of one of the depots after a Ministry-run fuelling station in orbit around Lorimar had suddenly shut down a couple of months ago.

Their task today was to see what was newly available, discuss barters and prices, and to establish new connections, if possible. They would move about independently, helping to conceal their numbers.

Mando's expertise was wanted, though he knew that he wasn't particularly welcome.

His reunion with the Tribe had been... fraught. He'd known that his place there wouldn't be the same as it was before Grogu, before he brought the Empire down on his people, and the truth was that it had never been without some friction—Paz and a few others didn't consider bounty hunting for often nefarious clients to be a trade worthy of a Mandalorian—but things had become even more complex than he'd expected.

The Darksabre had started picking fights for him while it was still resting in its hilt. Within hours of his arrival, Paz had challenged him for its ownership—claiming ancestral right—and Mando had accepted. They'd shed their jetpacks, climbed to the surface, and had battled both each other and the wind. It was a fierce duel, exchanging both injuries and the upper hand many times before Mando had finally managed to leverage a brutal gust of wind, swinging around and behind Paz, tucking the angry blade of the sabre under the edge of his opponent's helm. The Armourer, present as witness, had ended it there.

A day had then passed, during which he'd been reunited with those he knew and met the few new additions to the Tribe, which was now ten-strong and expecting to slowly grow.

The Deep Fountain would be their home. The Ceredans had felt a bond with the reclusive and embattled Mandalorians, and allowed their settlement. To the Tribe, Cereda had only proven her resilience during the attack, and Mando had recounted the tale of the mining base and the moon's four brave defenders. It had been decided that their sacrifices would be honoured for a full fortnight with a tribute flame. The covert was quietly building trustworthy local connections and had three ships—Rowan's Gauntlet starfighter, Paz's Plug-6 heavy fighter and a single-occupant Fang fighter considered to be the Tribe's general ownership. The fleet could have been four, but they wouldn't be counting the Razor Crest.

As that second day had drawn to a close and more fuel was added to the fires, the Armourer had asked each of them the question that had been haunting Mando like a restless ghost since he'd set out for the Madlands many weeks ago.

Din Djarin, have you ever removed your helmet?

It was less a question than a ritual for his people, repeated as an opportunity to affirm one's unfaltering commitment to the Creed. But even the ritual required an answer.

She'd had to ask him a second time, his silence setting the air on edge.

I have.

There could be no justifying explanation, no acceptable rationale. There was no tale so grand or dire that could have spared him the judgement that followed.

He was no longer part of the Tribe, no longer a true Mandalorian. To them, he was a fallen brother who had but one distant chance at redemption. He would have to bathe in the living waters beneath the mines of Mandalore, the ancient and sacred pools said to reach down to the very heart of the planet. Only in doing so could he renew his devotion to the Creed. But their planet was ash, the air poison, the mines destroyed, and the living waters surely lost.

He had followed mere whispers across the galaxy and navigated through the wildest corner of space, only to be sent back from where he came.

The Armourer had given him three more days at the covert, to plan and stock for his departure, before he would need to leave. He was also permitted to assist the Tribe during this time, which was why he was now tracing the Crest around Krynn, riding the upper-atmospheric wake of the Sparrowhawk, outcast but not yet gone.

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