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Do you want to get out of there?
He did not, as a rule, receive mail. Not from anyone other than his lawyer; and his lawyer, like everyone else's lawyer, was busy. There was a lot of work, and it was mostly more lucrative than pro bono work for an incarcerated juvenile. Even one who'd attempted, and very nearly succeeded, in killing the Jedi Grand Master.
He stared at the message, which refused to go away. On the one hand, he considered, it wasn't like anyone in this pit didn't want to get out of here. There was no really good reason not to answer honestly. On the other hand, he couldn't see what anyone had to gain by helping him, which meant almost certainly that it was a trap.
Who is this?
He didn't expect an immediate answer, so he was surprised when his 'pad pinged an incoming message only a few minutes later. It was, given the security on this place and the question of electronic lag, probably the minimum possible time. Too minimum, in fact, for there to be any ansible bounce involved at all. Whoever it was, they were on Coruscant. He thumbed opened the message, curiosity piqued.
Naberrie.
He stared. It wasn't that he had trouble believing it; this was, according to basically every action he'd ever taken and everything anyone could figure out about the man, exactly the sort of thing he'd do. It wasn't like he didn't have the pull to get a direct line to someone in maximum-security. It was just . . . Some of his motives, like the scandal that began with Orn Free Taa and was going to end with a war, were totally explicable. Some, like the Gravity, were explicable only in hindsight. Some were like this.
Why?
Again, the response was pretty close to instantaneous.
I want to make a point to Windu.
That made a certain kind of sense, he thought. It was nothing to do with him at all. Therefore, it was probably safe.
What will I owe you?
Nothing. I owe you a year and a day. This will not clear it, but it is at least a start. I pay my debts.
A year and a day. That was standard, for a certain kind of debt.
You did not kill him.
I did nothing to stop it, either. I was a Jedi, at the time.
It was hardly an original ploy: the Mandalore Wars were full of exactly this kind of rules-lawyering around debts and honor. Still, he recognized that Naberrie was attempting to give him a way out of what would, now that the war was over, otherwise be a suicidally heavy blood debt. If he took it, no Mand'alor worthy of the name could fault him for it. If he didn't, in fact, he'd probably be declared the same kind of insane as Viszla: dar'manda, with all that implied.
You do not give people blank cheques.
I do not. I will stand as your legal guardian until you hit galactic majority. Or I will give you a suit of armor, a fast ship, and some useful connections. It is up to you.
I want to talk to Windu.
That can be arranged.
I want to talk to Kyrze.
The response didn't come in for an hour, long enough that he'd stopped waiting for it and begun reading up on Mandalorian law by the time it did. The content explained the wait.
Kyrze does not want to talk to you. I think I can swing it, if I can show that my way works. You will have to pretend to be nice for at least a few months.
What would it be like, he thought, to be the kind of person who could just ask a planetary leader to talk to someone? 'Some useful connections,' indeed!
I want to talk to Viszla.
Talk, or negotiate?
He stared down at the pad. There was a particular meaning that the word 'negotiate' acquired in conjunction with Skywalker. So far, it didn't seem to apply the same way to Naberrie, and yet - assassinating Sidious. The Clone Personhood Act. The new Judicial Charter. Slowly, he felt a grin begin to spread over his face.
I want you to teach me.
You are not Force-sensitive.
He rolled his eyes, even though there was no one there to see.
You do not ever fight, and you do not ever lose. Teach me.
That will take more than a year and a day. Much more.
So?
He sat there, waiting for a response. It was a while coming. Probably someone on Naberrie's end was shouting. Probably, Naberrie was not fighting and not losing.
Done. Vode an.
When he needed something to happen, Naberrie did not fuck around. He'd known, of course. It just hadn't prepared him for the way that, a little more than two weeks after Naberrie's first message had popped up on his datapad, a judge was declaring that his imprisonment in the first place had been a war crime. Not that he was free, of course: he had attempted to assassinate Windu, and he had nearly succeeded. He just hadn't had a fair trial and, more importantly, he'd been fourteen at the time and therefore the entire crime was subject to juvenile courts.
In the meantime, a close relative was supposed to take charge of him. This "close relative" was two people, clones by the name of Waxer and Boil. The judge had attempted to balk at that; at least, they had until his lawyer pointed out that he and the clones were genetically identical, and it didn't get closer than that. Besides, it wasn't like the state wasn't stretched almost to the breaking point finding homes for war orphans, and if these two wanted the job, then so be it.
None of this fooled anyone, of course; but he was signed over to Waxer's care all the same, and then both of them waved out of the room.
"Well," he said, staring as the next case was called forward. "I'm impressed. What now?"
"Now," said Waxer, hefting the duffel that contained all of his worldly possessions, "we have a ship to catch." Then his expression softened a little, and he continued in Mando'a. «But we have a little time. We can go find a 'fresher if you want to put on your whites.»
He looked at the man blankly. «What?»
«Your iron skin? There must be a suit of it in here. I know I would be jumpy walking around without my whites, and you look like you are about to jump out of your skin.» He began walking away, duffel and all.
He jogged to catch up. «You are . . . not going to tell me I am too young?»
«Any brother of mine who could not get into and out of their whites in ten minutes by the time they were two standard washed out of the program. You are sixteen. Plenty old enough.»
«Oh.» He took a deep breath, then said, «That is, ah. That is my father's, actually. Our? Father's.» He shook his head. «I do not fit into it yet.»
Waxer didn't reply immediately, so much so that he looked up. «Huh,» said the clone. «Well. Do you want armor in the meantime?»
«What, so I can outgrow it six months?»
«Probably closer to four,» said Waxer.
«Yeah, my point exactly. Where are you going to get a suit of armor sized for a sixteen-year? Much less one every few months?»
«Kamino,» said Waxer, which shut him up.
They trudged along quietly for a little while before he said in Standard, "So . . . where are we going?"
"We haven't decided on a name yet," said Waxer. "It's a nice little seedworld in the expansion region. Clean water, healthy ecosystem, lots of fresh air. You'll like it."
"And when is Naberrie going to start teaching me?"
"Who says he hasn't already?"
He was quiet again, for longer. There hadn't been shouting, back in the courtroom. He'd gotten the distinct impression that someone - the Jedi prosecutor, or the judge, or possibly the bailiff - had wanted to. There hadn't been, and the one Naar attorney and Waxer had spoken softly, and everything had still turned out the way Naberrie presumably wanted it to. Thus, for the moment, he was supposed to stick with Waxer and learn everything he could. «I do. Want armor, I mean.»
Waxer nodded, as though ticking something off a mental list. «Do you need blacks too? A thermal undersuit,» he added to explain.
«Yes. Please.» It was much better to have thermals than not have thermals, even if he didn't end up needing them.
«And what kind of blaster?»
«I am not allowed to have a blaster,» he said.
«You are a brother. You not having a blaster is a kriffing crime, and anyway you'll need one. What kind do you like?»
«Last one I used was a modified JXP-21-R,» he said.
«Modified because the - »
« - power pack keeps jamming,» they said in unison.
«Yeah,» said Waxer. «Naberrie came up with a fix for that. Or remembered it, damned if I know how that works. We will start with a JXP-21-N, if you want to give it a try.»
«Wait,» he said. «What are my other options?»
They had a discussion of blasters, which neatly segued into a discussion of grenades. Boil, apparently, had been a hardware demolitions specialist, and so Waxer could talk accurately about them. By that time, almost without realizing it, they'd made it through the complicated Coruscanti public transportation, to a shuttleport and the waiting line for a surface-to-orbit shuttle. The line was mostly clones, and the ones near them sort of jumped in to talk about various kinds of antitank weaponry, which turned into talking about AT-ATs, how close was too close for air support, and fucking larties.
«And do not even get started on the travesty that is the Clawcraft,» said one of them, so of course they spent the next half hour, while they launched and docked with the orbital shipyard, talking about nothing but the Clawcraft. Actually, he kind of wanted to see one; they were right about the limited utility in strategic warfare, but they were meant to be used only in close ship-to-ship combat. They went kind of quiet when he said this out loud.
«Brother has a point,» said one of them.
«Yeah,» said another. «Hey, little brother. I did not catch your name.»
«Boba,» he said, before thinking, which was something he was never, ever supposed to do.
There was a moment of doubletake, and then the one who'd asked his name said, «Yeah?»
«Yeah,» he said, meeting the clone's eyes and daring he start something.
«They say you nearly killed Master Windu.»
«I did.»
«And you did kill Ponds.»
He frowned. «Sing spaced Ponds. I did not think she should. Honorable bounty hunters do not kill off-target, but she turned out to be completely Geonosene-fucker crazy.»
«Why did you team up with her, then?»
«I thought we were after the same thing,» he said. «Windu killed my - killed Fett.» Although he'd read the reports, same as everyone else, after Naberrie blew the conspiracy wide open and basically every slicer in the galaxy got to work tracking it down. Fett had died because Sidious had needed there to be no Mand'alor to point the Mando'ade at him. That it was Windu, as opposed to any other Jedi, was just bad luck.
«Windu killed Fett,» agreed Waxer. «So what are you doing now, not trying to repay him?»
«Naberrie took on the debt,» he said.
«Can he do that?»
«The entirety of the Mandalorian Wars says he can,» he replied. «He took the debt; I took his offer.»
«Must have been a good deal.»
«It was.»
«And you, vod?»
«Naberrie asked,» said Waxer.
This was apparently enough of an explanation, because the attention shifted back to him. «Actual Boba Fett. You are a bit of alright, brother.»
«Thanks,» he said.
The conversation turned back to starfighters, and then the big capital cruisers. It turned out they were going to be on one of the ones that had been retrofitted as a Judicial ship. About half the clones were crew; the other half were like them, heading for their colony on their as-yet-unnamed planet. So it looked like he was going to have a couple of weeks to get to know them. He wasn't sure if this was good or bad, but there was nothing to be done.
Settling in turned out to be as simple as following Waxer to their assigned berths and unpacking his duffel. Most of what was in it that wasn't beskar'gam was clothing, and everything that wasn't either one of those was datachip. Waxer looked at them curiously, but made no comment while he put them in the little safe for personals. Nor while he sat down and carefully set about caring for the beskar'gam. At least, not until Waxer said, «Here. Good for cleaning whites; it cannot be awful for iron skin,» and handed over a very nice armor-care kit.
«Oh,» he said, still not looking to Waxer. «Thanks. We made it onboard with plenty of time. Now what?»
«Now we do our damndest to figure out what Naberrie wants me to teach you, and why. If we are very good and a little lucky, we will figure out the first layer of it by the time consequences of layers two through seven start piling up around us.»
He laughed, softly. Naberrie, he had to admit, was that sort.
«Once the ship is underway, we can go to the range and start figuring out what kind of blaster to get you,» added Waxer.
He was as good as his word, too. The salle was not empty, so there were a lot of witnesses to him blatantly breaking his bail. None of them cared, except inasmuch as some of them started discussing blasters with him. He tried the retrofitted JXP-21-N, and decided that while Naberrie had somehow hotfixed the powerjam issue, it worked too smoothly now for decent trigger discipline. He tried other blasters too: the weapons locker had everything from small pistols to enormous antitank setups. None of them really caught him, so Waxer suggested he go to the fabber and build his own.
They did that, the next day. They didn't have to fabricate anything: there were just blaster parts for dozens of different makes and models, enough to assemble plenty of new blasters on the spot. He ended up creating a sort of mutant frankenblaster, power pack from one type mounted to coupling coils of a completely different type and a lens made of synthetic sapphire. It worked beautifully, was stunningly responsive, and that was what mattered.
He spent time at the range. He'd always been a good shot, but he hadn't been allowed to practice in prison and it showed. Waxer allowed this, to a point, and that point was four hours a day. It was demanded that another four to six be spent on education modules. He had been keeping up with those in prison, because there wasn't much else to do. As far as the assessments went, he was slightly ahead for his developmental age group. Poetry aside.
Waxer found this funny.
«What?»
«Skywalker had that same expression, with regards to the finer arts,» explained Waxer.
«Had?»
«We are talking about a man who recently spent a week talking to the Jedi Council only with quotes from famous poems, just to make a point. Naberrie is not the same person as Skywalker was.»
«Ah.»
It did give him an idea, so he sent a comm to Naberrie. The answer was prompt.
Mando'a war chants are poetry, of a sort. Specializing in an unusual style still nets you the arts credits, and you can claim heritage credits as well.
He frowned. It was an answer, and it was the answer he needed, but . . .
How many of the war chants do you know?
All of them.
Which he probably should have expected.
What's the point you want me to make to Windu?
How to treat homesick younglings, and why he's going to continue to make the same mistake as he made with me, over and over again, and why that isn't okay even if none of them can disassemble stars.
He turned to Waxer. «Can Naberrie disassemble stars?»
Waxer said, «Classified.»
He stared. If the answer were no, it wouldn't need to be classified. «You are shitting me.»
«Ask him yourself.»
Can you disassemble a star?
Let's just say that the Sith were not bragging when they named their ships 'star destroyers.'
Implied: he knew where at least one Sith star destroyer was, and he knew how to use it. Suddenly, the Jedi Council's decision to not kill him made a lot more sense.
And sending me off with a clone helps?
Sending you off with your brother helps. Vode an.
So he began to write false war chants, and that took care of one of his arts credits and also he applied for heritage culture credits. He was kind of surprised when they were approved before they even dropped out of hyperspace.
When they did, it was above a gorgeous little world, blue and green and banded cloud-white. Even from orbit he could see it was a great place.
«Why was this place never settled before?» he asked gazing down at it.
«Two things: the hyperspace lines coming out here were only mapped in the last few decades; and it is a Class D seedworld.»
«Ah,» he said. It explained why literally everyone on the ship either didn't care or actively helped him with his blaster. Class D worlds were different. «Why are you settling it? There are no easier worlds?»
«Easier, sure,» replied Waxer. «But one cannot grow as a person without conflict, and this way, the conflict is not against people. It is . . . clean. Pure.»
He blinked. Then he blinked again. Then he said, «If Duchess Kyrze were to ask for your assistance . . . ?»
«I would probably go help. She is a personal friend of my general.»
«If Pre Viszla were to ask for your assistance?»
«You are not seriously suggesting he is the Mand'alor.» Waxer didn't sound angry. He sounded amused.
«No,» he agreed. «Ex-Mando to the core. But if there were a Mand'alor worthy of the name?»
«Then we would get to see if I really do belong in the Mando, I suppose,» said Waxer.
« . . . huh.» Somehow, he hadn't expected this, although granted certain facts he should have. «How are you going to fulfill the First? I mean, if you and Boil are . . . ?»
«You would not believe the number of war orphans,» said Waxer. «Trust me, it is not a problem. You will get to meet Numa and Arreru when we make planetfall; they are going to come with Boil to meet us at Pontown.»
«Pontown?»
«The spaceport. Also pretty much the only city.»
«Very . . . rural,» he said, trying to be diplomatic. The effort didn't succeed, exactly, but Waxer grinned a little.
«You are not much of a city boy, either. Tipoca does not count.»
«Coruscant counts.»
«Prison also does not count. Come on, we should go pack.»
Pontown turned out to be a pun that had stuck. The whole city, and city was stretching the word to its limit given the population couldn't be more than a few hundred thousand, floated. It was all hexagons, tiling the water like a comb, and the hexes were either filled with building or left empty, reflecting the sunlight. The sun was very bright; Pontown had been built in a bay on the coast of the largest of the planet's three continents, almost perfectly on the planet's equator, and it was perfect day. The architecture was all prefab, except that it was clear that this was temporary and that there was a long-term plan. In some of the hexes, modern buildings of alumina and carbon fiber were going up.
Their shuttle landed in one of empty hexes, floating on a pool that was blocked by the surrounding pontoons. Once the wavelets had settled down, they opened the hatch to let everyone out. From the air, the pontoons appeared to be thin tracework around the hexes. Up close, they were easily five meters wide, and almost ten times that in length. The crowd of people standing on the nearest one, waiting for someone coming down, milled around.
He turned to ask Waxer how they were going to find Boil in the sea of identical faces, but his clone was already making a beeline for the clone with a twi'lek on his shoulders. He followed, more slowly. By the time he got there, the twi'lek was shrieking laugher while Waxer kissed Boil soundly. She was, he noted absently, wearing bracers and shoulder plates.
«Ew, gross,» said the twi'lek. «Grown-ups kissing.»
«Better them than me,» said a zygerrian boy, stepping around the kissing clones to get a look at him. He was tawny-furred and tawny-eyed, and he was also wearing bits of armor. «You are him? Boba?»
«Yeah. Which one are you? Numa or Arreru?»
«I am Numa!» said the twi'lek cheerfully, waving. «He is Arreru. Dad, let me down!»
«Not until I get my welcome-home kiss,» said Waxer.
Numa immediately leant in to give him a peck on the forehead, after which Boil put her down. She raced forward, and then offered her arm in the traditional Mando'a greeting. He took it, bemused, then accepted the same from the other clone.
Waxer said, «Boba, this is Boil. My other half.»
«Good to meet you,» he said, and was surprised to find that it was true. It was good to meet them, all three of them. It was good to be a place where everyone spoke his language and knew his name and didn't care. «Are we going to your house?»
«Not yet,» said Boil. «I put in for a few sets of youngling armor from Kamino, and then we will need to get it refitted.»
«Um. Why? I mean, we are the same. It should just fit.»
Waxer coughed. Boil said, «For you, yes. Numa no longer fits into her leg plates and Arreru is about to have a growth spurt, so I placed it all as one order. The ship will, in theory, arrive next week. We can stay in the city and help out until then.»
«Help?»
«Yeah!» said Numa. «It is fun. They print out the buildings in parts and then we put them together. Like a puzzle that goes up. Only Arreru never wants to play.» She pouted at him.
«Father said I do not have to anything I do not want to,» said Arreru, words sibilantly accented. «I do not want to be a builder drone. I contribute in other ways. They let me help at the Judicial center,» he said, almost as an aside to Boba.
«Er. Good?»
«Oh, you - Father did not tell you.» He turned to look a question at Waxer.
«It is your past,» said Waxer. «It is your choice.»
Arreru stepped behind Boil, as though to physically hide from him. To be fair, Boil was so much bigger than him that it pretty much worked. Boil said, «We should at least head to the dorms. I got us a suite this time.»
«Yay!» said Numa.
The suite was four rooms: a 'fresher, a combination kitchen-living room, and two bedrooms. There were bunks in one of the bedrooms, and a larger bed in the other. Numa bounded around checking everything out and then said, «Do you want the top? I want the top!»
«I want a bottom bunk,» said Arreru softly.
He shrugged. «I do not mind either way.»
«Great,» said Numa, and began unpacking her bag into the top bunk's locker. Arreru did the same with the other. He shrugged, and began unpacking into a third. It was interesting to see that both Numa and Arreru only had armor and clothes and, in Numa's case, a soft stuffed doll. Maybe they were keeping the rest of their belongings at home.
Numa bounced around for a little while longer, and then crashed. He looked at her, concerned.
«It's fine,» said Arreru, sitting on the bunk below her. «She will sleep for an hour and then be up again. I think Father and Dad are taking a nap. We probably should too.»
«A nap,» he said. «Sure.»
«A nap,» insisted Arreru. «This nose does not lie.»
«Oh. I - suppose.»
Arreru looked at him, and flicked an ear. «Father said I do not have to be your brother if I do not want to be. I want to get to know you before I decide. Will you answer questions?»
«Will you?»
«Some of them. Some of the stuff that happened before I came to live with Father and Dad . . . » He shook his head.
«I understand,» he said. There were parts he didn't like to think about either.
«Good,» said Arreru, and flopped over. «We can take care of each other.» The way he said it was oddly formal, like he was verbatim translating something that didn't quite work in Mando'a.
«Yeah,» he said, following suit and lying down. «Arreru, if I can ask - how are they? Waxer and Boil?»
«I like them. I have to do chores but they do chores too, and they are teaching me and Numa fighting to protect ourselves. They let me study whatever I want. It is good.»
«Okay,» he said. «Thanks.»
He did manage to fall asleep, and was woken again by Numa attempting to be quiet.
« - iss the food, though,» said Numa.
«Yeah, but it is near ship-evening, and Boba must be tired from all the new things.»
«Hmm?» he asked.
«Oh. We are going to get lunch, but if you are tired we can just bring you back some and then go to the construction site,» said Boil.
«No, I will get up. Give me a bit - is the 'fresher free?»
«Yeah,» said Arreru.
He felt much more awake after a quick shower, and they all headed off. First, they stopped at an open shop front, which displayed food in cases facing the street. It wasn't any particular cuisine, aside from the fact that most of the protein was fish. Well, of course it would be, with Pontown a floating city. He didn't like fish particularly, and ordered one of the few things on the menu that wasn't. It turned out to be rehydrated protein in a wrap, but done with sauce and vegetables so it tasted much better than ration bars.
They chatted as they walked along. Well, sort of. «I understand a little,» he said, to Boil and Waxer. «I think. Naberrie wanted me to be with Mandalorians, as well as with family-by-blood.»
«Yes, and also no,» said Boil. «There are many families like ours, who would have been happy to take you. He asked us, specifically. We have not discerned why this is.»
«What did he say when you asked?»
«That he wanted you to be with family who are Mandalorian.»
He snickered, and so did Arreru.
«Like I said about layers,» said Waxer. «Numa! Not too far!»
«'Kay!» said the twi'lek, although she did range slightly closer. It was hard to lose track of her anyway, with her healthy green lekku.
«He said to me he wanted to make a point about homesick younglings,» he offered.
«Then I am sure that that, also, is true,» said Boil.
He frowned, but they were too close to things he did not want to talk about. He changed the subject. «Tell me about this building we will be doing. Or, ah, I guess Judicial?»
«Judicial is simpler,» said Boil. «A large portion of us decided, after the war, to go into bounty hunting.» It made sense, in a way. The Clone Personhood Act entitled all ex-troopers to the education of any citizen, the education they'd been denied on Kamino, but not all of them wanted to sit down and learn how to be a civilian. Even so, there weren't enough bounties in the galaxy for all of them. «Well, I say bounty hunting. Really what we decided to do was exterminate slavery. The bounties on slavers were just a convenient excuse.» That made more sense.
«The Judicial facility here is a whole complex,» said Waxer. «Prisons for slavers, and accommodations for their psychologists and their lawyers, and the judges. Also, for the former slaves, a safe place to recover. To learn how to be themselves. Arreru is particularly good with the younglings.»
He tilted his head. Arreru stepped behind Boil again. He could see it. «Okay. And the building?»
«That is a longer story,» said Waxer. «Short version is that there is not a whole lot of credit on-planet, but it still needs to be done, so we all just pitch in. As long as you are doing something, things like food and shelter are a given.»
«Oh.»
«It is more complicated than that, of course,» said Boil. «There are a lot of virtual credits floating around in the background, and someone tracks all of that; but brothers take care of each other.»
«Does this clan have a name?» he asked.
«What?» asked Boil.
«I mean. I think it is a clan. Helping out regardless of personal gain, that is what a clan is. Do you have a name?»
«Usually we just call ourselves brothers and that takes care of it,» said Boil.
«Even if there are millions of you? Um. Us?»
«Everyone else in the galaxy knows who we are. And we know who we are too. We do not need a name.»
«The slavers know who you are,» said Arreru, words crisp with satisfaction.
«Yeah,» he said, then decided to steer the conversation away from deeper things. «Have you been following the Orn Free Taa scandal?»
«Yes!» said Arreru.
So they talked about the impact of the scandal, which kept growing as various slicers got at financial data. The Banking Clan was neck deep in the money-laundering. On top of the rather illegal double-dealing during the war, they were almost certainly going to lose their charter. Almost four dozen senators were suspended pending investigations, and would soon be dismissed pending trial. Arreru's eyes were bright and shining, and he'd unconsciously pulled back his teeth to reveal lots and lots of needle-sharp teeth.
He made a mental note: never get between Arreru and a slaver.
They stopped at the Judicial complex to drop him off, and then proceeded on to a hex not very far away. The buildings were . . . odd. They bobbed gently up and down on the waves, but they also swayed. He asked about it.
«It is because of the hurricanes,» said Waxer. «They have to flex with the wind, or they will be destroyed by it.»
«Hurricanes?» he said. It was almost always raining outside Ticopa, but the city was too far into the hemisphere to get hurricanes.
«This planet gets them. Pontown is on the equator.»
«And so you did not build on the mainland because . . . ?»
«Damncrocs,» said Numa cheerfully, popping up beside Waxer.
«The local wildlife. The numbers for colonization do not work without fishing. We are slowly claiming the mainland; it is just going to be a while before we have enough that we can spend arable land on city-building.»
«And the water is easy reaction mass,» added Boil.
«Ah.»
The construction was insane. Usually, you'd build the first floor and then the second and so on, up to the top. Except here. The buildings were built from the top, and then enormous hydraulic jacks used to boost it so the next level down could be built in place. It meant all building took place at or just above water-level. This, is turned out, was because each building-in-progress sat on top of a truly massive printer, whose mass could only be supported in the water. Rather than spending energy lifting the material up to the build floor, the clones had opted for the jacks.
Building wasn't that difficult. Each piece was big, but ultra-light. Of course they were, the buildings had to float and also flex. They just picked one up from the printer, walked them over to where the little numbers said that piece went, and then lasered it into place. Numa found it great fun to run back and forth with huge pieces of wall on her head. He was more inclined to agree with Arreru, though: the work was not difficult, but it was dull. Further, the lasering was fiddly enough that no one could really chat while working.
After four hours of that, he was ready to stop and eat and crawl into his bunk. Even Numa was flagging. Waxer and Boil didn't push him. The only hiccup was when they went to collect Arreru. A bunch of - of youngling ex-slaves, he supposed - had latched onto him and were not going to let go. Arreru had to explain several times that Waxer and Boil were his parents, and even then the younglings were dubious at best. They agreed only when he promised to return the next day.
He was as good as his word, although Waxer made them spend the next morning on education modules. Boil went and probably made progress on part of the city, and returned around noon with food. He was going to be so tired of fish. They spent the afternoon in the same way as the previous day, and then the evening was hand-to-hand in the suite. The common room was big enough if they pushed all the furniture aside.
He'd mostly adapted to planet-time a few days later, when he asked Boil about blaster practice. He didn't want to go rusty again after just having a couple weeks to practice. Fortunately, Boil agreed, so they went to a range. It had moving targets, which was great. His aim, and his ability to not shoot the blue-edged cutouts of civilians, were not so great.
He also messaged Naberrie a few times, just to check he still could. Naberrie answered on a delay, but that was because they were now on different planets and their days not longer lined up. He still wanted to talk to Windu. Naberrie thought it wasn't going to happen until the Jedi Council got over the fact of the Naar and started dealing with the war and how much of it was actually their collective fault.
ETA?
Well, it's been years and they're not done yet. If nothing happens by the time the babies start walking, I'll prod things along.
He smiled, helplessly.
Take a holo. I want footage of that.
No. Closed Council sessions are closed for a reason, Fett.
Typical.
By the end of the week, he'd more or less settled in. Then, of course, the ship from Kamino arrived, and with it three sets of armor. They didn't head to the receiving and distribution building until the next day, though. There were much more important things, including rations and printer cartridges. Then there were the thousands and thousands of vials of CASPR virus that were the first major production run of the clones' gene-fix.
There wasn't a huge line when they arrived, though. Boil explained when he asked:
«Everyone just gets a comm. We give the system three or four times, and the system replies with a fifteen-minute window. I made a note that we have younglings so a daytime spot is really necessary. Other brothers have been here all night, getting dosed.»
«How do they decide that?» asked Arreru. «Who goes first? There are not enough doses for everyone.»
«Speedies first,» said Waxer. «With us, it makes a difference, but not like for them. Every extra month of waiting means years off their lives. Once they are stable, those of us with children are ahead of those without. None of us want to orphan anyone twice,» said Waxer. «After that, it will be a general lottery.»
It really was that efficient. They walked up, told the the clone who they were and what they were there to pick up. Boil signed for them, and within ten minutes they were walking away with three small crates of armor. «Next, the fitter?» he asked.
«Yeah,» said Boil. «I made the appointment for later since I did not know when our window was going to be. We have some free time.»
«Oh. Can we go help? All those cartridges have to take some moving.»
«You want to?» asked Waxer.
He shrugged. It was at least different from lasering buildings together. Also, he wanted a closer look at the printers. They were high-end, and while organic cartridges were cheaper than, say, rhodium ones, this still had to be costing someone a coded credit.
They dropped the armor back at the suite. Well, they dropped Arreru's and Numa's. Numa demanded that, since he was a clone and the armor would fit, he try his on immediately. He protested only for show; he'd gotten used to the naked feeling of not wearing it, in prison, but he really did want to start fulfilling the Second as soon as he could. The thermals, what Waxer called "blacks," went on a little loose and then tightened to his skin. The armor went on white and shiny and fit like a glove. Of course it did.
Numa was extremely, loudly appreciative of his look. Arreru was quiet as usual, but smiling a little. Waxer said, «Kind of like looking into the past. We need to get you some paint.»
«Yeah,» he agreed. Unless the operation was during a blizzard, he'd stand out like this. He needed to see what the environment around here looked like before deciding on colors. «Much too shiny.» Armor shouldn't gleam.
Boil muffled a laugh in Waxer's shoulder. Numa had him turn around again. It was heavy, and he was a bit awkward. That only meant he should start doing things now.
The thermals were amazing, though. Despite it being full armor, in a port city, on the planetary equator, he wasn't more than a little warm the rest of the day. They spent some of it directing hoverpalettes full of cartridge around the city. The empty hexes made sense. In addition to being convenient landing spots for space-to-surface shuttles, they also made it possible to supply the printers. He didn't get a look at them, disappointingly: there were teams in dive suits waiting with empties. All they got to do was lower the palette into the water so the divers could swap them, and then it was back to the distribution center.
They only managed four of those anyway. The whole city moved on foot, and on some of the pontoons near the center, moving walkways. People made room for a hovercart, but it still took a long time to walk one to its destination. Then Boil called a halt and they went to get Numa's armor fitted. For all she was an energetic bundle of activity, she had no trouble standing still while her armor was partly melted and cooled, over and over, to get the new curves just right. Arreru, surprisingly, did. He was twitchy, and it was a bit more difficult to fit for him since they knew he'd be growing but didn't know what his final dimensions were going to be.
«Okay?» he asked, at about the time it looked like Arreru was going to go nuts and start blasting.
« . . . yeah,» said Arreru. «I can do this. I like armor. It is just uncomfortable.»
«Uh-huh,» he said; but Arreru didn't offer anything more, and he didn't press.
They asked if he wanted paint now. «Not yet,» he said. «I need to see the terrain first.»
«Terrain?»
«You know. So I can paint good camouflage?»
«Oh,» said Boil.
«What?»
«That is not why we paint our armor,» explained Waxer. «We paint so we can tell each other apart with our helmets up.»
It made sense, for them. They weren't meant to fight stealthily; they were meant to fight in groups. It wasn't like it would make a difference in ship-to-ship combat, or clone-to-droid. Nothing in the traditions around armor decorations said anything about it having to be sensible - Mand'alor the Indomitable was famous for blood-orange armor. He said, «Fett green?» If nothing else, it was a good base for forest camouflage.
They left a little while later, his armor now an even matte green, Numa's a shade of pink that clashed horribly with her skin, and Arreru's mostly white with gold highlights, spotted along his spine.
«Now we go home?» asked Numa.
«Maybe. It is several hours away by speeder; it will be the middle of the night before we get there. Do you want to wait until tomorrow?»
«No, it is fine. I can sleep in the speeder.»
«Arreru?»
«My own bed,» said Arreru.
«Then I guess we will head back now,» said Boil.
They had to go back to the suite to get their things, and then went out to one of the longer-term speeder ports on the periphery of the city. The headed, not to the mainland like he was expecting, but straight out across the water. He made a surprised noise. Before either of the adults could respond, Numa was chatterboxing away.
«We live on an island! It is easier because once you locally clear all of the large predators out, it is impossible for new ones to migrate in. And we get hunting and farming and fishing, so there is plenty of food.»
«I see,» he said. «How big is this island?»
Numa shrugged. Boil, who was not driving, said, «A shade shy of a thousand square klicks. There is an archipelago heading out from the mainland; ours is only about halfway along, but it is about as far out as anyone lives. There are almost two hundred families now. There is plenty of room for more, but a lot of people do not like being so far from Pontown.»
«Does it have a name?» he asked. He was half expecting it not to; the clones seemed reticent about pinning down names.
«Mashup,» said Arreru. «Because all the families are a mashup of clones and war orphans and slave rescues.»
«That is a very Mando thing, though. Mandalorians have never cared about species. If you follow the Six, you are a child of the Mando.» He smiled. «I like it. Is there a map?»
«I will upload the data to your helmet,» said Boil. «You can explore it virtually a bit.»
He did. The helmet was great too. It had a decent little onboard computer and heads-up display, and was configured to be able to connect to a local network. The speeder didn't have one, but it found Boil and Waxer and Numa and Arreru and made a little ad-hoc anyway. When he got bored of reading the island's contour maps and ecological surveys, he asked Numa for a game of dejarik. They did a couple of those while the sun set, and then Numa decided it was time to sleep, and so did Arreru, and he thought he might as well.
He woke to the HUD pinging, and blinked, momentarily disoriented by the tiny space. Then he said, «Here already?»
«Yeah,» said Waxer. «Come on, you just need to get into a real bed. We will give the full tour in the morning.»
«Okay,» he said, and followed them through the dark. It was not a quiet dark; the local bugs and small nocturnal mammals and slightly bigger nocturnal predators that ate them made for a continuous raucous background. The noise cut out when he got to the door, and then he stopped.
They'd built out of local supplies, which mostly meant wood and fiber. It was clear that they hadn't been very good at building to start, and hadn't been significantly better to finish, and it did not matter. The wood, under the warm light, was warm and welcoming; and even their few appliances were brushed brass and copper. He felt his breath catch in his throat.
«All right?» asked Boil in concern
«Yeah,» he said, stepping forward into his home.