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yoditorian · 11 days

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Lacuna - The Rewrite - Part 2

din/gn!reader

i split the original chapter into two upon rewriting, which is why the second half is missing

original part 2//series masterlist//main masterlist

word count: 3.1k // warnings: some swears, too many italics, that's literally it tho, still 18+ no babies

“-wiped out, no one survived.”

“Well, someone did.”

They’re arguing, still. And you’ve been delivered five meals since being directed into the small office for questioning. So it’s been at least a day, almost two. Probably. The voices in the hall fade, they must be off to discuss your situation with someone who might be able to make the decision. They’ve already searched you and your pack - already confirmed you’re not a spy for the Empire - so what’s the hold up?

You don’t hear a set of footsteps approaching the door, too wrapped up in your own anxieties about what might happen if they don’t let you in. Which is probably why you jump half a foot in your chair when the door slides open. It reveals a woman, dark hair and sharp features, deep green flight suit tied at her waist. She’s pretty, although she’s clearly not sure what to make of you just yet as she eyes the binders at your wrists.

“What do you do?” She asks, arms folded as she leans against the doorframe. You don’t answer straight away, not sure if it might be some kind of test, but at least she doesn’t look overly annoyed that she has to repeat her question to get an answer.

“Pilot, mechanic, fucking janitor - whatever, honestly.”

“Triple threat,” Her voice is even, but she’s fighting a smile that gives her away immediately. Not a test, then. “What kind of experience you got?”

Shara has to admit that the rumours of a surviving member of the Corellian spy ring had piqued her interest. Jet fuel runs in the blood there, it’s a safe bet that whoever the generals had spent the better part of forty eight hours grilling has more than enough experience to hop straight into a starfighter. And with heavy losses in recent months, pilots are something the Rebellion is desperately short on.

So she isn’t shocked when you start listing every planetside transport, every planet hopper, cargo freighter, gunship, and starfighter you’ve ever worked on or flown. The list is extensive, impressive honestly. It dwarfs the experience of many of her colleagues, and Shara can’t help the thrum of excitement in her veins. Not only are you an experienced pilot, but you’re a mechanic - a scrapper, the rebels need more scrappers. Too many politicians, too many people who are far too used to having every resource in the galaxy at their disposal. It’s a glimmer of hope, she realises, in a night becoming all too dark for anyone’s liking.

“So, you can fly anything?” Shara asks, no longer hiding the wide grin on her face.

“Anything.”

You’ll fit right in, she decides - there and then.

And you do, you slot in like you’ve lived your whole life orbiting Yavin.

They drill you like there’s no tomorrow, you’ve got the deep muscle aches to prove it but it’s thrilling. Your back hurts and it’s everything you ever wanted it to be. Where the Corellian spy ring was all sneaking and secrets, the Rebel base on Yavin IV is a full scale production. Every daylight hour is spent running the same manoeuvres in the main four fighters - before you know it, you could fly any one of them with your eyes closed. Despite the pain and the exhaustion and the repetitive nature of the training, you love it. But you’ve got your eyes on the prize.

A coveted position in one of the primary starfighter squadrons has conveniently opened up, its previous placeholder reassigned, and you’re not the only one who’s sure that the fourth bunk in Green Squadron’s barracks has your name on it.

“I know I don’t see you coming for my track time.” Shara Bey’s voice is loud and clear over the buzz of the hangar, and you can’t keep the smile off your face despite the ache deep in your bones.

“Maybe I am, are you finally gonna do something about it?”

Shara launches herself at you the moment you set your datapad down, a boisterous laugh echoing off the ships. You’re steadily climbing the ranks in training, the years of experience already under your belt make you more confident in the cockpit than the other new recruits and you’re not afraid to pull a stunt or two. A flawless dead drop recovery had earned more than a few nods of approval from some of the qualified pilots. Although the Commander overseeing the recruit training made it clear that it was definitely what landed you with patrol maintenance duty on top of your usual drills in the first place.

“I talked to Draven.” She says, and your stomach flips. You’re leaps and bounds ahead of the other recruits, for sure, but nobody seems to want to sign off on your training. There’s always something about required hours or simulation times or more drills. You’re starting to get the feeling that, while you’ve got enough support from your would-be colleagues, no one in command wants you in the air at all.

“I told you I would!”

“I know, I know. But look, if I ask it’s more like an endorsement.”

“Shara-” You’re talking over one another, but not missing a single word. It’s a talent that leaves the commanding officers astounded more often than not.

“He said he’d think about it, which in command language means no-”

“Tell me there’s a but.”

“But,” She grins widely, “He told me if you get this next info grab done, he’ll put in a good word with my commanders. And my commanders know I’m not going in the air unless you’re at my nine o’clock.”

Shara’s been far more welcoming than just about everyone since the moment she’d rocked up to your interrogation room and asked about your experience. And, over the moon to find you wandering around the halls and out of the binders, she’d spent the whole of your first night curled up in your bunk in the recruit barracks - recounting every little bit of drama she could think of. By the morning, you know who was dating who, who wasn’t happy about it, which crews were rivals, and which held the fastest course runs. Hers, obviously .

You weren’t as forthcoming with your own journey, only mentioning that you’d run with some rebels for a while on your home planet, made a few detours along the way - she didn’t seem too surprised, and you wondered how much of that she knew already. Ran’s voice, still, in the back of your mind reminding you that everybody has an agenda . But her eyes were so open, so kind, you’ve yet to see that slip. Shara Bey might be the first genuinely good person you’ve ever met.

“And Kes’s crew is due to swing by tomorrow, in case you’ve changed your mind.” She winks, although she already knows you well enough to know you won’t take her up on the offer.

It had come up that first night, somewhere along the way, when she’d started lamenting about the pitiful state of the dating pool. Not something she had to worry about anymore, thank God, but a nightmare nowadays if you were after anyone who didn’t have history with someone in their own crew. She was happy to get her boyfriend to set you up with one of his friends - Pathfinders, never on base long enough to establish a history with anyone, fine enough to pass the time, and strong enough to manhandle you a little. If that’s what you’re into.

You’d still been a little wary of sharing too many details about your history, something about how you weren’t interested muttered in the dark over the quiet breathing of the other new recruits. You could only tell her that you didn’t expect to see him again. He’d gone home, you didn’t even know where home was. She’d understood, with an arm around your shoulders and an attentive ear if you ever wanted to share more, although she made it clear that the offer of a muscular pair of emotionally unattached Pathfinder arms was always open.

It’s close to a year since you got scooped up by their spies for asking about the Rebellion, but Shara’s never failed to make it seem like much longer. Like you’ve been best friends, sharing lunches and secrets on the landing pad in the shade of her A-Wing for your whole lives. Even now, she’s looking at you like she knows you - backwards, forwards, sideways, inside out. Truth be told, she kind of does. It’s a closeness you’re sure you’ve never had with anyone, and you know you wouldn’t give it up for anything.

“Someone came here last week having never left his planet before and they put him on the training roster. You’ve logged more flight time than any recruit I’ve ever seen and we didn’t even have to teach you in the first place. I know you’re Draven’s golden child, but he can’t keep you on the ground forever, kid.”

“You can’t call me ‘kid’, I’m older than you.” You laugh, shoving her shoulder with your own.

“You’re ruining the moment.” She winks, pressing a kiss to your temple before she waves at a commander calling her name and makes her way to her ship.

The datapad beeps a reminder from its resting place on your tool trolley, you need to pack for your intel grab. It shouldn’t be a long trip, Draven had assured you, a simple in and out: information in exchange for protection and transport to the base. Protection and transport optional. He makes the hard decisions, you’ve learned during your time running the smaller missions for intelligence. The more important runs get given to rebels like Cassian Andor and the group of mercs you’d seen filing into the command room a few days ago. It was an odd combination, seeing people like that somewhere like this, and you know you shouldn’t have stared but you couldn’t help yourself. Weapons strapped to every empty space on each body, armour and clothes on a number of species from all across the galaxy. One of them had looked jarringly like you, although you hadn’t really gotten a good look at their face before they’d disappeared.

Just this mission, and you’d be in the air next week. Hopefully. It’s enough to get your feet moving towards the barracks to pack.

You only need the basics, a change of clothes and some medkit refills. Just in case. Except there’s still an empty space when you zip it shut, sitting heavy between your neatly folded shirts and the top of the bag, and you keep looking at your blanket. It gets cold in hyperspace, a voice in the back of your mind pipes up, and you decide that’s good enough reason as any to fold it in alongside your supplies. It smells solidly of the clean soap of your bedsheets, his scent - Din’s scent, a mix of metal and warmth - had faded before you even plucked up the courage to go looking for the Rebellion, all those months ago. You still hold it to your nose for a moment, just to check, before it too gets folded and laid in the top of your pack.

Now you’re ready.

Din isn’t overly fond of Nevarro. It’s not an unbearable heat, the dry plains are to thank for that, but he’s not a fan of days where the wind picks up and carries the sulphur of the lava fields under the lip of his helmet. The covert welcomed him back, more or less with open arms - though he’s not sure if their ever-dwindling numbers might have had anything to do with the warm reception. He hadn’t let them go without a cut of his pay for every job he’d done for Ran, always sending something back to the foundlings, so at least he hadn’t totally abandoned them. The Armourer decided he should be their beroya , their bounty hunter, and within days he found himself tracking a quarry in a system he’d never heard of. It was easy, really, to take the skills he’d garnered all his life and apply them to this. Paz had laughed with the familiarity of an old friend and told him that if a skinny thing like Din was their beroya , they were all fucked. So at least no one was openly angry that he’d left them.

The guild rep slides a puck across the table, metal scraping against the stone, and the blue hologram flickers. The human man staring back at him is unassuming, but the notes suggest otherwise. A former senator’s assistant, with strong connections to both the Empire and the Rebellion. Din nods, flicking the puck off and tucking it into his pocket without another word.

His loyalty is to the covert, to the Mandalorians. It always has been and it always will be. This is the way. But one mention of the Rebellion has his mind surging back to thoughts of you. Everything in his life seems to. Every time he sets foot on the Crest all he can see is you, bent double with your head in an access panel and a greasy rag tucked into the back of your pants. He’d see the sun and remember how you always used to turn your face to it, just for a moment, whenever the team ran jobs planetside. You’d never told him where you came from, but Ran had let bits and pieces slip over the years. In the looming shadow of the Razor Crest, Din wonders if you ever made it off the station. If you decided to drop everything and find the rebellion, the way you said you would when you were half asleep on his chest, your mind fucked out and hazy. He hopes you did.

The tracking fob brings him to a semi populated planet, somewhere near the border of the Unknown Regions. Vast swathes of land and water are completely uncolonised, left to nature, only a few cities dotted here and there over the whole planet. The bounty is evidently in possession of some brains, having chosen a mid-sized city to get lost in, and Din is almost disappointed that he knows it won’t take long. Wishes he’d picked a different puck, a little further away. Just to keep his mind occupied and out of more dangerous territories.

He stays vigilant, but pays no mind to the beeping of the fob on his belt. He can steal a moment, he thinks, to take in the area. To live the life of some extravagant explorer in his mind while he does a little recon, the life he might have led before it was cruelly snatched away in seconds on Aq Vetina. The last thing he expects to see when he walks into that crumbling little cantina is you.

Din spins on his heel and is out of the door almost as soon as he enters, slipping down the alley to the side of the building to catch his breath. He’s fairly sure you don’t notice - but his mind is reeling, echoes of the vows he swore as a child and the Armourer’s words swirl in his ears.

His loyalty is to the covert. His loyalty is to the covert. His loyalty is to the covert.

But he only sees you. The way you always had time for him back on the station, how you told the others where they could shove it but always gave him a smile. You went above and beyond to help him without complaint when he asked, only ever got snippy with him when someone else had pissed you off first. He still remembers the way you felt in his hands, how you sounded, how you tasted. He still thinks about it on quiet nights, more often than he should. This is not the place to remember, there’ll be time for that later, although his body needs another minute to be completely convinced.

All he feels is guilt, once the blood comes back up to his brain. Guilt over the covert, over his vows and his creed and his people. But what’s more convincing is the guilt he has over you. Over how he just walked away, left you sleeping, and took the ship you’d spent months working on. Even if you were the one who told him to take it. You’re beautiful, still. Of course you are, you always have been to him.

You notice when he walks in this time.

The sunlight streaming in from a window catches on the glass of his visor and your heart jumps into your throat. You don’t know if he’s spotted you yet, as he takes a seat at a table by the door angled away from you. Logically, you’d say it could be any Mandalorian. But you spent countless hours studying the way he moves, you had to know his gait to know if walking around a corner would get you killed or not. It almost had on more than one occasion. You could recognise his footsteps anywhere.

The untrained eye would think him relaxed, as relaxed as a man in head to toe armour can be, but you know better. There’s a tension in his shoulders, the same he used to get when Xi’an made another move on him with that grating giggle or Qin handled a blaster too roughly. His hand sits on his thigh, fingers splayed, ready to find the smooth contours of his blaster at any moment. Ever the soldier, never quite at ease. Apart from the last time you thought you’d ever see him, it seemed.

He leaves before you’re even done with your drink, sitting there for barely five minutes when he throws a couple of credits on the table for a drink he didn’t buy and stalks out. You sigh and down the rest of your drink, hoping it’ll quell the nausea rising in your stomach. It doesn’t, but you follow him out all the same.

You’re sure you were right behind him, weaving through the slowly emptying streets as the sun sets and the chill of the night begins to settle in, but now he’s nowhere to be found. Until you feel a set of eyes land heavily on your shoulders. You turn, slowly, and catch a glimpse of where he ducked into a narrow alley. The city’s full of them, but you’re certain he hadn’t been there when you passed it.

A long moment passes when you’re swallowed by the shadow of the buildings towering either side of you, a moment where he just watches you. You can’t deny you’re watching him too, carefully surveying his armour for new nicks and scrapes. There’s more than you’d like to admit to caring about.

“What are you doing here?” He breaks the silence, the tension, first. You shrug.

“Working, what are you doing here?”

Din holds a small round disk in his palm, arm stretching out towards you as the holo flickers to life and you’re faced with your contact for the intel drop.

“Working.”

Fuck.

And that’s when a really, really bad idea starts to take shape.

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#summary is i love shara bey and i want to be her best friend end of chapter #lacuna #the mandalorian x reader #the mandalorian x you #din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #star wars fic #the mandalorian fic #liz does words

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