Chapter Text
“Adi ba’vodu!”
Ben huffed out a laugh before he bent down to let Numa slam into him, her skinny arms clinging to his neck. He nodded a greeting to the Young on duty at the Nursery, 2 Humans and one Twi’lek.
“That’s a new one,” he said, settling her on his hip. “Where did you get that name from?”
“Buir’e call you ‘Obi’, but Khiyosh ba’vodu calls you-.”
“Whatever it is, you probably shouldn’t be repeating it,” he interrupted firmly. The nearby Twi’lek overheard and snickered; they were clearly familiar with Khiyosh’s moods.
“I’ve heard people call you ‘Ben’ and ‘Obika’ and ‘Benika’ and ‘Adika’ and 'Obi' and 'Obi-Wan' and-.” Numa paused to gulp down a huge breath. “Why do you need so many names?” she demanded plaintively while one of the Human Young turned away, not that that hid their amusement from him.
Ben smiled at Numa, dropping a kiss on her forehead, just below the line of her lekku wrap. “All the better to confuse you with, my dear,” chuckling at her adorable scowl.
“Obi-Wan,” the other Human Young, Sehitte, called out with an admirably stoic face. “Did you want us to comm Cerasi or-?”
He grimaced. “Nayc, vor’e, I’ll get to it in time. I just thought I’d spend some time with the ad’e before- well.”
Sehitte chuckled. “You can take the Babbies for storytelling time.”
“Sure,” he easily agreed, smiling when Numa cheered in his ear. “Lead the way in, my dear.”
Ad’e regardless of their planet were always such a joy and a light. Their minds were so bright and untamed and so very happy to see him.
“It’s such a pleasure to see all of you, too,” Ben said gently, folding his legs beneath him. A Human Babby immediately took that as permission to climb into his lap, quickly followed by a Twi’lek Babby, who didn’t so much crawl as fall into his lap, letting out a squeak when she ended up squashing a lek beneath her.
“Careful,” he murmured, easing her weight off her lek and blunting her discomfort with the lightest touch of Manda. He felt Numa’s small hands on his shoulders, feeling her way up into his hair.
“You have so much,” she marvelled. “Jenta’s got lots, too, but it’s different.”
Ben looked at the Babby in question. Jenta’s black hair was twisted into thick locs down the middle of her back.
“Everyone’s hair and lek are all a little different,” he said. “Esek’s lekku are yellow, and Rhyyes’s hair is thinner and softer.” He smiled at the gap-toothed boy. “Babby-soft,” he added, lightly tugging at one of the long chestnut wisps just to see him grin.
“But you’re the only one who-. Hmmm.” Numa’s hands were still patting away at his hair. “What do you think, Nagine?”
A pale blue Twi’lek hopped up to stand next to Numa, behind him, adding their hands to his hair.
“Maybe,” they thought aloud, “if we use the bigger wraps? The ones for older Twi'lek. Humans have these things-.” And then he felt small fingers pinching his ear.
Ben laughed, tipping his head back to look at them. “What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
“We want to wrap your hair like lek!” Numa chirped.
He laughed again. “Why?”
Nagine shrugged. “'Cause.”
Ben looked at the rest of the surrounding Babbies. “What do you think?” he asked them. “Should I let Numa and Nagine do my hair?”
“If it don't work,” Rhyyes said, “we can do it different.”
However his hair ended up, Ben was still going to have to wash it thoroughly after this; he did not want to know where the Babbies’ hands had been before they started sticking them all over him.
“Alright,” he agreed, going to pull out the pins, but the Babbies in his lap whimpered out a complaint, and the Human went so far as to claim his hand as a pillow to keep it from being moved again.
Jenta laughed, leaping to her feet. “We can help!” she volunteered. Rhyyes scrambled upright, too.
“I’ll get my brush.”
“And I’ll get the wraps!” Nagine exclaimed, dashing off.
“This is going to be quite the undertaking, isn’t it?” Ben asked the Babbies in his lap. The Twi’lek giggled sleepily, turning to curl against his thigh. “I was told it was storytelling time, though.”
“After,” Jenta ordered, carefully picking pin after pin from his hair and sticking it into her own, where they vanished almost immediately. “This is more important.”
“Yup!” Numa agreed. “Wrap first, then we can have storytelling.”
“Num’ika! It’s time to- is that- Obi?”
He sleepily stirred, buried as he was under several warm bodies.
He heard Rod’s laughter overhead. “What’s you doing here? And what-?” Rod’s laughter grew louder. “Babbies, did you do your ba’vodu’s hair?”
Numa wiggled out from under his arm. “Adi ba’vodu is a Twi’lek today!” she cheered. “Everyone helped; innit cool?”
Rod started laughing again, and there was the very unsubtle sound of her taking a holo or 5. Ben couldn’t bring himself to care, given how Nagine was flopped across his chest, the Babbies were still in his lap, and Jenta was curled between his ‘lekku’, purportedly to 'guard' them.
“It’s something, alright,” Rod promised. “Rise an’ shine, yall, it’s snack time!”
Some of the Babbies shot awake at that announcement, while others grumbled and groaned.
“Obi-Wan,” Rod chided. Ugh, she was bringing out his full name. “You hiding from responsibilities again?”
“I’m not ‘Obi-Wan’ today,” he muttered, resolutely keeping his eyes closed, “haven’t you heard? I’m ‘Adi ba’vodu’.”
“Yeah, Num’ika, how’d you get that?”
Jenta started up the chant of his aliases, followed by Nagine, and it was quickly picked up by the rest.
“Ba’vodu has so many names,” Numa complained loudly, “but ‘Adi ba’vodu is just for us Babbies.”
That was possessiveness he was feeling from the Babbies and pride from Numa, but it was suffused with love.
“You staking a claim on your poor ba’vodu?” Rodu asked through her giggles.
“What’s ‘staking a claim’, buir?” Numa’s young voice carefully sounded out the unfamiliar words.
Jenta abruptly pushed into a sit. “Is it like Adoption?” she demanded. “Can we Adopt Adi ba’vodu?”
Oh, by the ka’ra.
Jenta’s words sent the entire Nursery into a tizzy, and the Babbies who had run off for snack time promptly ran back, scattering crumbs in their wake. Ben eased upright, only for a Babby-missile to knock him back onto one elbow. Nagine rolled off with a squeak, crawling out of the line of fire - wise one, that ad. If only Ben also had that option.
“Oof!” he grunted, wincing as he gentled the stranglehold around his neck. “Be more careful, ad.”
But that was before Jenta promptly glomped his shoulders from behind, smacking his cheek with her thick locs. “Can we say the gai bal manda with Adi ba’vodu? Gedet’ye, Rod ba’vodu?” she whined.
Rod was laughing so hard she was wheezing. Ben swallowed back the reflexive alarm at the sight, knowing Rod’s lungs were long-healed, and this was nothing more than a sign of her good humour. Still, though. He sighed, leaning back against Jenta, who promptly let out a delighted squeak and clung harder.
“Only you,” Rod managed through her laughter, “only you could end up being Adopted by literal ad’e!”
“I think it’s a sign of their good taste,” he sniffed.
“Ro’ika, what’s taking you so long?” came Rizzo’s voice from over by the entrance. “Did the Babbies bribe you into staying again?”
“Buir!”
Those were Numa’s footsteps, tearing off towards Rizzo, and then the sound of their bodies colliding. Rod was still chuckling to herself, an arm absently wrapped around a Babby who had climbed into her lap.
“Oh. Is there another visiting Twi’lek?” Rizzo asked, sounding confused. Her words set Rod off again, while Nagine preened.
“Isn’t it pretty, buir?” Numa exclaimed. “Nagi did the wrapping, but we all helped!”
“What- oh, by ka’ra, Obi?”
Rod laughed so hard she fell off her chair, startling the poor Babby in her lap.
“Oh, ni ceta, Bab’ika, I jus’- I jus’-!” And then Rod dissolved into laughter again, actual tears streaming down her face.
“It’s pretty, not funny,” Nagine insisted.
“Oh, no, I weren’t laughin’ at Obi’s hair, Nag’ika, ori’haat,” Rod wheezed, wiping her eyes. “S’amazin’, a work o’ art. Jen’ika, tell Rizzo what you wanted to say to Obi, will you?”
Jenta huffed, and Ben could see a little scowl on her small face. “If I says it, will you let us?”
Numa clung tighter to Rizzo’s neck. “Gedet’ye, buir?”
The older woman snorted. “Shouldn’t I know what am I’m agreeing to?”
Numa shook her head so quickly Rizzo had to lean back to keep from being smacked by her lekku. “Nuh-uh, agree first, buir!”
“Gedet’ye?” Jenta asked, still leaning on his back. “It’s nothing bad, ori- ori-.”
“Ori’haat,” Rizzo gently supplied, “alright.” Her words were greeted by a deafening round of cheers, and Rod started laughing again.
“Oh, now you done it, cyare,” she snickered.
Rizzo raised her eyebrows. “What,” she began, “have I done, exactly?”
“I wanna do it!” Nagine exclaimed.
“Nuh-uh, me,” Numa protested, only for Rhyyes to stomp his foot.
“Jenta aksed first,” he insisted.
Ben chuckled, amused despite himself. “Asked, my dear, and that she did,” he agreed, tilting his head to look at the Babby clinging to his shoulders. “Did you have something to say to me, Jen’ika?”
“SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Rhyyes shushed loudly.
Jenta walked around to face him, her small face set in a serious expression. She put her hands on his shoulders and stared into his eyes, their faces so close together their noses were practically touching.
“Adi ba’vodu,” she began, both of them ignoring Rizzo’s startled sputter, “ni kyr’tayl gai cuun- uh, we’re too young to have Babbies!” she wailed plaintively.
“How about a friend,” Ben quickly offered, before Jenta could work herself into a proper tantrum. “Burc’ya?”
“Innit helmet?” Rhyyes asked.
“That’s ‘buy’ce’,” Rod explained, patting the Babby’s hair.
“Buc’ya,” Jenta carefully repeated. “Ni kyr’tayl gai cuun buy’ce.”
Rod fell over laughing again.
Cerasi stormed into the Nursery, her guard peering curiously over her shoulder. “Why is Sehitte spamming me about coming to the- Obi?”
It took several long minutes to get all the Babbies settled after that, most of them in a clingy, celebratory mood. They hadn’t wanted to let go of him, but Sehitte had lured them away with a promise of playtime out in the gardens.
“Oh, ka’ra, Obi,” Ces muttered, running a hand over her shorn skull, “are you really going to leave your hair like that?”
Numa’s hand tightened in his defensively, the only one of the Babbies to have stayed. Ben just smiled, that same smile Khal almost always wore when Ahlora Wren was nearby. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean. And after all the Babbies' hard work-.”
Rizzo lifted a hand to hide her giggles, but Rod had no such restraint. Ces just grimaced, sending Numa an apologetic look. The one she sent him was far sharper.
"Don't think I don't know what you're doing," she growled. "The Babbies, though. Nagine, was it? Who did your hair. They're quite talented." Numa sniffed. “It’s just, uh, a little hard to take you seriously while looking like that.”
Ben’s smile widened. “Ces, have you ever taken me seriously?”
She threw her hands up in the air and stalked towards the meeting rooms, but her guards were trying to hide their smiles, too.
Rod smiled, reaching for Numa. “I’ll head on home with Num’ika first,” she told Rizzo, “you can fill us in later.”
“Actually,” Ben interrupted apologetically, “there’s a bit of news for Num’ika, too?”
“Oh?” Rod asked, dark eyes sharpening.
“Good news, ori’haat,” he promised, but gently nudged the girl so she would run to her buir.
“You’re such a mess, Obi,” Rizzo muttered, slapping him on the shoulder to propel him forward.
“You wouldn’t recognise me any other way,” he retorted.
Ces had sat herself at the head of the meeting table, an unimpressed look on her face. “Honestly, Obi-!” She cut herself off halfway, shaking her head. “I can’t even look at you!”
Ben smiled at Numa. “The Babbies did an excellent job, didn’t they?”
“Elek!” she chirped, reaching forward to give him a high-5. “You promised buir you had good news for us.”
It was easier to deliver this part of the news to Numa, at least. “Elek, I did. Congratulations, Num’ika, you’re bu’vod!”
“I’m what?” Numa shrieked, and then she tore out of Rod’s grip for a leap, hugging him with her whole self. Accepting her excitement was far easier than looking at the stunned faces of his vod’e.
“Tell me, tell me!” Numa was chanting in his ear. “When can I meet ‘em!”
“I think,” Rizzo said slowly, “I speak for all of us when I say, what the kark, Obi?”
“Well, yes, one moment, if you would,” he huffed, setting Numa on the floor and patting her head when she pouted up at him. Cerasi’s eyes were boring into him, though.
“This has something to do with how the Mando’bral were on limited comms last month, isn’t it?”
That term was an interesting one, one Ben and his aliit never used to refer to themselves. Jaster might have been Mand’alor, but they weren’t an Empire. Still, he could understand the need and convenience of a collective term for those currently at the core of their policy-making, for simple ease of reference. Ben wasn’t certain who coined the term, but to use bral, their word for a defensive position on high, was an ingenious choice, one which not only reflected the protective quality of the Mando’ad bal val Mand’alor, but also extended towards their vod'e the respect Ben hoped they’d earned.
He nodded. “Elek. This doesn’t leave the room - is that understood?”
Cerasi nodded tightly.
“And I still can’t give you the full story because there are far too many moving parts still in motion,” he added, grimacing apologetically.
“I think,” Rod said, “that Numa and I are gonna get started on latemeal prep. Elek?”
Numa glanced up at Rod, and then at the rest of them, before nodding slowly, her mouth trembling.
“Once we’re done,” Ben promised, “I’ll come over and tell you all about gar bu’vod’e, ori’haat.”
Numa sent him a weak smile, while Rod rolled her eyes at him. “Extra settings f’latemeal, got it. Say ret’ to your buir, Num’ika.”
She ran to squeeze Rizzo around the middle. “Ret’, buir.” Rod sent the room a general nod, and then led her out, shutting the door behind her.
“What osik you gotten yourself into this time, Obi?” Rizzo growled, locking the door after her riduur. “And does that have to do with Ronei comming Khiyosh and them being uncontactable ever since?”
Ben winced, absently rubbing his neck. “Oh, Khiyosh is doing perfectly well, don’t you worry about them. They are a part of the story, though - they and more ad’e.”
Cerasi’s eyebrows were rising higher and higher. “Start from the beginning,” she ordered.
It might have been years since they were on a battlefield together, but his spine still straightened at the sound of her voice.
“Long story short, jetii osik happened,” he said bluntly, “and Mando'ad now have the care of 5 Manda-touched ikaad’e. Myles is caring for the twins while Jango is at Zygerria, Silas is caring for one, and the remaining 2 are with me.” He stopped.
Rizzo let out an exasperated sigh. “Obi, there are so many missing steps between this and that first one-.”
Ben shook his head sharply. “It’s a matter of internal security; Melidaan isn’t involved.” He thought rapidly, before shaking his head again and correcting himself. “Or rather, Melidaan won’t be involved. This is a- a courtesy call, I suppose you could say, because you are ner vod’e, and I would like Numa to know her bu’vod’e.”
“And Khiyosh?” Cerasi asked.
“Their expertise with amputation was needed,” Ben said flatly. “Komari ba’vodu was tasked with retrieving an ad who was being tortured. She retrieved him, along with his 2 vod’e, but lost her legs in the process.”
Both Cerasi and Rizzo winced; they likely remembered how Khiyosh’s first amputations had gone. Ben knew he hadn’t forgotten, either. Over her head, Cerasi’s guards shared a glance, and Ben belatedly recognised them as Havla and Cy’Baoth. He offered them a faint smile.
“The twins are under Myles’s care and he would certainly appreciate the moral support,” he said. “He would have commed you himself, but he’s still adjusting to caring for them and knew I was coming here, anyway, and the details don't need to be leaked over unsecure comms. Before you ask, he won’t do the gai bal manda, not with Jango still away.”
Cy’Baoth nodded slowly, and Ben remembered they had always been less vocal than their partner.
“We’ll comm ‘em,” Havla agreed. “Ces-.”
She rolled her eyes, waving them off. “Send Myles my regards, too. If you want to take the week off, make sure the schedule’s properly sorted before you leave.”
Havla and Cy’Baoth glanced at each other.
“We’ll comm Myles first,” Havla said, “and then figure it out. Vor’e, Ces, Ben.”
Cy’Baoth waved at Rizzo before Havla pulled them out of the room by their other hand.
“They excited, you think?” Ces asked, gazing after them. “Or-?”
Rizzo clicked her tongue at the older woman, chiding. “They’ve done well to be ori’vod in the Nursery, did their duty same as the rest of us.”
Ces sent her a sharp look. “It’s not the same. You know Myles was soft on ‘em, and vice versa.”
“They’ll take it the same any Babby still in the Nursery greets Numa, never mind we’ve Adopted her,” Rizzo retorted. “You know why none of the surviving Young never agreed to the gai bal manda. Excepting Obi, that is,” she added, nodding at him.
He nodded back, acknowledging her words.
Ces sighed. “I just worry.”
“You’re doing too much of it and over the wrong things,” Rizzo said bluntly, “Havla and Cy’Baoth are Young grown. Now, I’m leaving yall to talk, but you know you’re expected for latemeal. Both of you,” she insisted when Ces opened her mouth again.
Ben just saluted. “Sir, yes, sir.”
Rizzo took another look at him and snorted. “Lookit you, you’re soft for ad’e, too. Suppose it don’t surprise me that one of ‘em wormed their way in eventually.”
“2,” Ben gently corrected, “2 of them did.”
Rizzo rolled her eyes. “Keep the blood off the carpet,” she ordered, “this ain’t one of those meeting rooms.”
And on that pleasant ending note, she walked out, leaving them alone.