Chapter Text
Aurra was nervous. Jango thought that was a load of osik , but he knew better than to tell his nine-year old daughter to just relax.
And a little humility and fear were good, they kept you alive.
Not that Aurra needed to worry about surviving her first official spars with other children her age.
It was one of the most important parts of the Clan Vizsla spring housing, as Jango, Pre and pretty much everyone else had eventually begun referring to the time of year when Vizsla ad’e took over the Concordia keep.
Over the past five years it had become Aurra’s favorite season, a time dedicated to stories and crafts and playing with all her cousins. After Aurra’s second Vizsla spring housing, she’d asked if Jan’buir would be there next year.
Jango remembered Pre’s carefully blank face, the tone of his voice when he told their daughter ‘we’ll see’.
He’d made sure to attend every single one since, even if he could not stay the entire season.
There was no way he was missing Aurra’s spar.
“You shouldn’t be so excited to see a bunch of ad’e beat on each other.”
Jango snorted and turned away from the sparring ground to his riduur .
(It was nice, perfect, to look at Pre, even just think of Pre, and think of that word, riduur . He liked when Pre whispered it into his mouth, or growled it into his ear, or said in his annoying, copyc drawl on their private comms while they sparred, or half-murmured it as Pre reached for Jango when he came to bed late.
Pre Vizsla, Alor Vizsla and former ward of Mand’alor Jaster Mereel, and Jango Fett, Kyr’roya and Tomad be Sundari belonged to all of Manda’yaim , but riduur’e Pre and Jango belonged only to each other and their ad. )
“Why not? I think any buir would be excited to see their ad fight.”
Pre rolled his eyes and crossed the open walkway until he stood next to Jango at the edge of the sparring ground, where they could speak without being overheard.
“She’s nervous.”
“ Lek .”
“I think she’s scared she’ll use the Force if she gets scared.”
Jango scoffed and crossed his arms.
“She hasn’t had an outburst in well over a year, not when she’s awake. And Goran Mon told both of us and her that she has great control in a fight. If anything, they want her learning how to use it more.”
It was a challenging thing to manage, teaching Aurra how to fight with the Force, and still making sure she did not depend on it, but she was doing well.
“I didn’t say I’m worried, I said she is.”
The first participants in Aurra’s age bracket entered the sparring ground. Pre focused his entire attention on the spar, and Jango did the same.
For the ad’e be Vizsla , it gave them confidence to be treated so seriously by their alor. And Pre did, though not for the reason the ad’e liked to believe, that Pre was looking over their training as the clan’s future verd’e.
Pre was looking for signs of abuse, or harsh training. It was impossible to not find some techniques and drills and sequences that had been used by Kyr’tsad . The group was born from this clan, and Clan Vizsla has existed long before Kyr’tsad , and they would exist long after.
If Pre did see something (at one time a very, very common occurrence), he would make note of the ad’e and investigate further. Sometimes he took care of it himself, brutally and definitively. Other times he played the game, made sure others discovered the abuse to bring to him publicly, allowing Pre to be further removed from the political fallout.
Jango couldn’t blame Pre for this. He knew what would happen to Clan Vizsla without Pre keeping them firmly under his thumb. For all the ad’e be Manda’yaim , Pre could not make a mistake.
The two little fighters in front of them weren’t particularly skilled for their age, though one showed more flexibility than one would expect even from one so young. Jango lightly kicked Pre’s shin, then put on his buy’ce and went to find another angle to watch the fights.
Jango tapped into one of the drones above the sparring grounds. From the feed, he watched Pre get closer to the sideline while touching his ear. When he lowered his hand, Jango turned on their private comm.
“I know you like to be seen at these things, but we are Mando’ade , they should feel more comfortable with you in a buy’ce .”
“Yea, yea, let me know when you’re in position.”
Position was right at the sparring ground entrance, so he’d be able to get a good image of Aurra for the rest of her aliit. (Jango wondered if other parents approached child-rearing like a military operation, or if it was just Mando’ade. He’d ask Yuned, but the man had very, very complicated feelings about ikaad’e and ad’e .)
“In position.”
“Good, feel free to share any concerns, though I may not be able to respond.”
Translation: go ahead and say whatever osik you want but I can’t respond or show any real fucking emotion.
“Who is teaching these kids, especially the little one with the red stripes? I know they’re ad’e , but come the fuck on, at least make sure your kid knows how to fully complete a sequence.”
Pre hummed his agreement.
The Vizla ad’e spars were broken into three parts; a few minutes of hits and blocks that were pretty much choreographed with nearly all armour-on-armour contact, then both ad’e were permitted one take down of their opponent, showing how they go from standing to capturing their opponent or taking them to the ground, followed by a few minutes of grappling.
It was tightly controlled, and made sure each ad’e was focusing on specific skills, not just trying to beat one another to the ground. And instead of actually winning a spar, they were judged and received points. Each little fighter would have three of these spars, and their points from each would be added together. The winner would have the most points in their bracket.
(The scoring system was so popular it had been brought into some of the adult competitions as well, especially those related to jetpacks, grapple lines and flamethrowers.)
Finally, the first spar was done. Jango hoped both ad’e did better in their later spars. Over the next five spars Jango gave his critics while fielding messages from Jaster, Arla, Tani, Myles and Ursa Wren about whether or not Aurra had already fought. He, of course, complained about this as well.
Pre didn’t even try to hide his smile from across the sparring ring, the shabuir. By the sixth spar he was bored, so he began to tell Pre, in detail, how he’d treat his riduur that night, when his duties for the day were over and Aurra was in bed.
Pre had been stressed for the past two weeks getting everything together for this Clan Vizsla spring housing opening event his underlings had created and grew every year. It was always stressful, but this year Jango had been off-planet on a job that went too fucking long during most of the final preparations, so he couldn’t offer any support besides a willing ear.
But tonight, he’d get out a tingling oil he’d picked up on Zeltros, and he’d work the stuff into every single one of Pre’s tight knots and stressed muscles.
Jango started going into detail about Pre’s lower back before Pre stopped Jango, saying, “lets discuss this further when not watching ad’e spar.”
Well, Jango couldn’t disagree with that, though few of the children had been in any way impressive. He wondered if Aliit Vizsla needed to re-learn more about how to properly train without abuse. He shared the thought with Pre.
An alert at the corner of his screen told Jango he was getting a voice call. It wouldn’t be a client, and he’d already messaged all interested parties about Aurra’s spar, so they could wait. The alert went away, then started back up again a few minutes later. Jango groaned and told Pre he was taking a call from one of their busy-bodies.
The man just smirked.
“What is it? I ignored your call for a reason.”
“Hello Jango, thank you so much for answering a call from your Mand’alor .”
Jango rolled his eyes.
“I don’t think the Ancient Taung were talking about an anxious ba’buir calling to gossip about their bu’ade .”
“Oh Jango, I think we both know the Taung would absolutely call and call and call to hear about their bu’ad’e .”
Jango just sighed, long and breathy so it would sound like annoying static over the call. Jaster snorted.
“But really, how is it going?”
“She’s nervous. She shouldn’t be, but.”
“Of course, of course. We know she’ll do fine. I told her last night to not worry about the Manda . Verd’e have been using it for millenia, she will be no different.”
“Exactly. Maybe if we all say it enough times, in different ways, she’ll believe it.”
Jaster laughed.
“Probably not. She won’t know it until she goes out there and does it herself, like her buir that way.”
Jango felt his brow furrow, Pre was great at synthesizing advice and concerns quickly and putting them into action, then he realized Jaster was talking about him. Great, he was probably blushing. Good thing his helmet was on.
He and Jaster had slowly, slowly built a kind of understanding with one another. It had started after Jango and Pre had declared their intentions, at least to each other. Jango had not taken Jaster’s first peace offerings well, bitter that the man had known him for years and only just now, after nearly a decade, was really willing to work with him.
Arla had been the one to remind Jango that Jaster hadn’t been alone in his previous animosity.
(“The first time he gave you a job, you tortured the target, then killed them, then sent Jaster the body. And made him pay for the shipping.”
“I got the information he wanted, didn’t I?”
“Jango.”
“I answered the Mand’alor ’s call. It's not my fault the Mand’alor wasn’t more specific with what he wanted.”
“....”
“Alright, so it's not all him.”)
Then Aurra came into the picture. They loved too many of the same people for Jango and Jaster to keep so much distance between each other. Like the opposite of the old saying, the loved one of my loved one.
Jango can admit, just to Pre and Yuned, that he's also settled down quite a bit himself. He still goes out and hunts the last Kyr’tsad hold outs, and he will never say no to Yuned when he calls for support, but he spends most of his time in Manda’yaim now. Arla has even tricked him into taking a few jobs for Jaster’s government and sitting on a few minor councils.
He sighed. Might have to ask Arla about bringing some standards in ad’e training based on these spars.
“What, am I wrong?”
“Not that, just these spars.I think Pre’s been almost too successful ripping Kyr’tsad from the clan. This year’s ad’e in Aurra’s age group don’t seem that well-trained.”
“Or maybe you’re just comparing them to your ad , who is very advanced.”
Jango shifted in place, glad Jaster couldn’t see his tell.
“Are we… (ugh, he didn’t want to ask Jaster for advice, why wasn’t Mij the one pulling the annoying ba’buir routine? And that answered itself, since Mij and Tani both had Aurra call them bu’vodu. )
“Just ask Jango.”
“Are we focusing too much on it, her martial training?”
“Does she like it?”
“ Lek. ”
“And none of baar’ure or gorane have expressed concerns?”
“None.”
“Then she’s probably fine. Might want to put her in some other lessons though too, she likes music, and painting. Might help balance everything out. But you and Pre are good buir’e . And neither of you think you know everything she needs. That’s important too.”
Jango nodded, reassured and a little annoyed at it. But, well, Jaster was good with ad’e . Both before Arla became his heir and after Pre officially became his ward, Jaster regularly took in ad’e on a short-term basis.When people associated with the Haat didn’t know what to do with a kid, they sent them to Jaster in Keldabe.
(Arla told Jango once, after they’d gotten Aurra, that Jaster always wanted to be a buir and she’d always thought he’d eventually claim a foundling. But a year or two early he’d told Arla that his priorities had shifted when he gained bu’ade , and he now wanted to dedicate himself to offering that same kind of support to other young buir’e in the system who were without the support of a strong clan or their own buir’e .)
Jango sensed the crowd begin shift, more conversation between the on-lookers.
“Gotta go, she’s up next.”
He hung up halfway through Jaster’s well wishes. Had to keep the man humble somehow.
Jango made sure he was turned just so in order to get the best angle of Aurra walking from the warm-up tent (where none of the buir’e or trainers were allowed to be, a rule Jango had completely supported until he was kept out himself) to the sparring circle.
Obviously, she was taller than her opponent. No surprise there. Her training armour was painted a riotous mix of blue and orange. The symbol of Jaster’s Haat Mando’ade painted in green on one bes'marbure and the sigil of Clan Vizsla in stark white on the other, just like Pre.
Haar’chak , he was glad his helmet was on, no one wanted to see his buir tears.
His private comm with Pre flicked on.
“Look at her, Jango.”
Jango huffed a watery laugh.
“I’m looking, cyare. ”
She walked straight and proud to the center of the ring, her opponent, a girl from Clan Reau walking next to her. If he remembered right, she was also an heir to her clan seat. Probably a political decision to have them up against one another.
At the center, the spar referee had the girls shake hands. Then she let them start their spar. Aurra’s hits were precise and powerful, pushing the smaller girl back. The little girl held her own though, her own attacks just as well placed though some were a challenge with Aurra’s height.
“They should have paired them based on height and weight, not aliit .”
Pre snorted and in the drone feed Jango saw him smirk.
After their choreographed hits were completed, it was time for the take-downs. The little Reau girl went first. She’d backed up for a running attack, common with ones this age, though a little dangerous.
It became clear quickly that the girl didn’t particularly care about that. She ran right at Aurra, who braced for the other’s attack. The girl put herself just under one of Aurra’s shoulders, an approved move, then brought her leg up and dug the heel of her boot into the inside of Aurra’s thigh.
Pre growled and Jango turned off their private comm as he began yelling at the referee. He wasn’t the only one, though Pre kept himself still and relatively quiet.
Aurra yelped (his baby had yelped! In pain!) when the girl kicked her but Aurra had responded quickly. She was supposed to let the other girl take her to the ground, but instead Aurra wrapped her arms around the shorter girl, holding her position, before slamming her down to the ground.
(Certainly not as hard as she could have, from Jango’s point of view.)
She then hopped back up quickly, followed shortly after by the other girl (more proof Aurra hadn’t been as hard as she could have). The referee intervened then.
Jango turned the comm with Pre back on.
“What is happening?”
“Shut up, trying to listen.”
Jango shut up.
Both little girls talked with the referee. The verd was obviously wearing a buy’cy, but both of the ad’e had not yet received their helmets. The little Reau ad looked both worried and determined. (A combination Jango was intimately familiar with) but their Aurra stood tall. She turned slightly and Jango choked on a laugh.
“ Cyare, she looks just like you.”
“Shut. Up.”
Jango made sure to focus his buy’cy recording in closer, and took a few steps to the side. Icy, disdainful and poised, just like Pre.
The referee said something to both ad’e and they nodded. The referee then signaled and their comm was broadcast over the ring.
“ Ad Vizsla has requested the previous take-down be marked as her attempt. Ad Reau will now make her take-down attempt. Any unauthorized movements will be an immediate disqualification from the event.”
“Pre.”
“I know, Aurra’s idea apparently.”
Jango refocused the view on his helmet to a wider view of the arena. He also checked the drone feed of Pre. His riduur was unsuccessfully fighting a scowl, arms crossed. A few Vizsla clan members had come to stand near Pre, likely to show their support.
The referees hand went up and the little Reau girl made a second attempt at a take down. She once again took a running headstart. This time she tried to jump high enough to wrap her arms around Aurra’s shoulders. Aurra grimaced but kept standing, not allowing the girl to complete her move. After the allotted time, Aurra shook the girl off and walked back, face once again cold and disdainful.
“Our little warrior, Pre.”
“She’s something.”
The grappling went quickly. Aurra won, but it was closer than Jango had expected.
After, both girls saluted the referee then exchanged a warrior’s handshake. Jango could tell Aurra had said soemthign to the other girl, but he could tell what.
“ Haar’chak ”
Even through the comm, Jango could here the verd’e around Pre cheering, pounding their chestplates and stomping.
“What did she say?”
He checked the feed. Pre had brought one hand up over his mouth.
“She said ‘you should train more, it will take more than cheap tricks to stand against Vizsla Aliit ’.”
Jango laughed and pounded his own chest, filled with shereshoy from his daughter’s response.
It pierced him then, straight through his heart. He turned off the private comm with Pre, sure his riduur would think it was to give Pre leave to talk with his clan all around him.
Really, it was to hide his own heartbreak.
Jango was distracted by his ad .
“ Jan’buir ! How did I do?”
She threw herself at him and Jango twirled her around, another small heartbreak, to think some day he wouldn’t be able to do this anymore, when she got too tall for him to swing her like this.
“Ah, ner ad , I am so, so proud of you, for how to compete and for how you handled yourself. Comm ba’buir while we go get Buir , he was bothering me before your match.”
“Okay!”
She set up her comm, then took Jango’s hand, a smile across her face while she told Jaster about her match. Jango sent Jaster, and the rest of their alitt that weren’t pacifists the recording, adding some text directing them to look at Aurra’s face when she and Reau girl talked to the referee.
The rest of the day was chaotic. Aurra had another match in the afternoon, her third would be the next day. Pre also had too many fucking things to do, and Jango offered his assistance wherever it was requested.
That night, in their bedroom, Pre sat on the chair he and Jango both used when taking off their boots and lower armour and groaned.
“What a long day. How does this get busier every year? Why don’t I say ‘no’ when people bring new ideas? Am I dinii’la ? Haar’chak !”
Jango stood in front of his riduur and waited for Pre to look at him. When Pre looked up and gave Jango a tired smile, Jango sank to his knees.
Pre gave him a slow grin.
“I thought I was getting a massage, not a blow job.”
“ Ni ceta, ner riduur, ner cyare .”
Pre sat up.
“Jango, me -”
Jango ground his forehead into Pre’s knees.
“Today, when you told me what Aurra said to that Reau ad , my heart soared with joy, that she would defend her clan and their pride. Ni ceta , Pre Vizsla, that I never let myself feel that joy, that, that love, for your clan just because they are your clan. I swore, I swore, to share everything, and I didn’t share this, your love and duty as alor be Allit Vizsla , not until now, until Aurra claimed it. How can I claim to be your riduur when you, you were not-”
Not enough. Jango didn’t want to say it, that Pre had not been enough in anyway. It was Jango who had not been enough.
Jango tried to breath, try to keep the tears at bay. Pre’s hands stroked through his hair along the shorn hair at the back of his head.
“Look at me.”
He didn’t want to, but he owed more than that to Pre.
His riduur stared into Jango’s very soul, like only he could.
“Maybe, if I was not Mando,ade , I could hate you for it. But Jango, ner riduur , you love our ad more than you hate the people who took your buir’e and tortured you, who took and killed and tortured your vod’e. You love her that much?”
Pre bent down and pressed their foreheads together, then ground his own forehead into Jango’s just a bit, like he was trying to force what he was saying through his riduur ’s thick skull.
“There’s no debt, not for that. It makes me love you more, Jango Vhett.”
Jango tipped his head in order to kiss the words from Pre’s mouth. The kiss was languid, and deep. Perfect.
Pre pulled back just enough to rest his forehead back against Jango’s.
“You are giving me that full body massage you promised though, so I guess I will claim that debt. And our mouth, got me excited seeing you on your knees for me, ner riduur .”
Jango laughed, tears finally falling.
“You
shabuir
. Finish getting your armour off then get on the bed.”