I do not own Star Wars in any capacity.

Welp it's happened. I've caved and written my first The Mandalorian fanfiction. Hope you enjoy!

It was dark out, the village quiet and serene. It wasn't the same thick silence, filled with fear, that had infected this place before. With the walker destroyed and the bandits dealt with, the village had gone back to its own sense of normalcy. It took a few days of clean up and rebuilding, but they seemed to have bounced back quickly.

He took off his helmet and set it aside with a sigh, running a hand through his hair to loosen it.

A soft and familiar giggle had him turning towards the cradle. The child was gripping the wooden railing and smiling up at him. It was impossible for him not to smile back. The kid's mood was infectious. And nowadays they were always in a happy one.

He started to remove the rest of his armor, setting each piece down on the table to be cleaned. Now that the danger was gone, there was no longer any need to keep it on as he slept.

There was a set of handmade sleep clothes sitting on a chair next to the bed. Omera had left them for him when they had first arrived. Taking his gloves off, he picked it up and rubbed the fabric between his fingers. It was thin and soft. And the thought of wearing it to bed made him very uncomfortable. While the villagers had been nothing but respectful of his privacy, wearing their native clothes was just too much.

Once he was comfortable in his own clothes, he set to work cleaning his armor. He picked up one of the pauldrons first. He wiped it down before adding a bit of solution to the cloth to give it a harder scrub.

A soft coo drew his attention. Somehow, the child had climbed out of the crib and up onto a neighboring chair without him noticing. It was strange. The child seemed to be constantly vocalizing, yet they had this uncanny ability to sneak up on him. It should have unnerved him. But it didn't.

They wiped one of their tiny three fingered hands over a portion of his cuirass, blinking down at the surface.

"Yeah it's dirty, isn't it?"

The child looked over at him with wide eyes, their ears slowly raising and lowering. He was pretty sure it meant the child was curious. Honestly he had no idea if the kid even understood what he was saying. You'd think after fifty years of living in this galaxy you'd pick up on the Basic. But while they seemed to understand him, he wasn't convinced that it was his words that the child understood.

Still, it was nice to talk to them. It was… different than talking to other people. The child sat down in the middle of the chair which dwarfed him, wiggling their body to settle in before looking up at him expectantly.

"You've seen me do this almost every night," he said, focusing back on his task. "Surely it can't be that interesting to watch?"

They just smiled and continued to gaze up at him. This wasn't the first time they had seen him without his helmet. Before, when the child had only been an asset to him, he could simply shut the child in their bassinet when it came time to sleep. But after what happened with the Client...

He couldn't deny that the child was a part of his aliit.

He continued to clean his armor, talking out loud about what he was doing and making sure the kid didn't stick any of the pieces in his mouth. He wasn't certain, but the polish he used could not be good for a child, fifty years old or not.

"Stop that," he chided gently, pulling the pauldron from the child's mouth again. "Didn't Omera bring you some toys to play with instead?"

They just giggled, their eyes following the pauldron as he set it back on the table.

After he finished cleaning, he got up with a sigh. "Okay, time to sleep." He picked up the child and placed them back in the cradle. "Sleep," he ordered.

And again, the child just giggled as it gazed up at him.

With a small shake of his head, he turned out the light and laid down on the bed. He closed his eyes and willed himself to relax.

There was a soft coo and a nudge on his hand.

He opened his eyes and looked down, seeing the child on the bed next to his hip. In the pale moonlight, their skin looked almost blue. Had this been anyone else, it would have been startling. But the kid seemed to always invoke a sort of calm in him. "Hey kid. What are you up to?"

With a little yawn, the child crawled up so they were right next to his middle. Then they curled up against his stomach, their ears lowering as they pressed their forehead to his side.

He could only stare at the child as their breathing evened out and they fell asleep in less than a minute. He frowned slightly, not sure what to do. What he should do is get up and put the kid back in his cradle. He didn't want to roll over the kid in his sleep or have the kid just fall straight off the bed.

But as he continued to look down at the tiny bundle at his side, he found he couldn't get himself to move. It didn't seem right to disturb them. And it was hard to deny… it was nice to have that tiny bit of warmth pressed against him.

So with a final sigh, he placed a hand over the child's back and closed his eyes again. He lost himself in the sounds of this place. The buzzing insects, water gently trickling, the sounds of the fauna just barely audible over the rustling of the tall grasses and trees…

And the soft breathing at his side, in time with the rise and fall of his hand.

Please leave a review to let me know what you thought!