#carbonite

You opened your eyes slowly to let whatever light beyond your eyelids filter in slowly, allowing your body to take the recovery process one step at a time. 

But the light never came. 

Maybe your eyes weren’t open?

“I told you she’d be alright, Djarin,” you heard in a thick accent from a few steps away. “She’s a fighter.” That gruff voice was Boba’s for sure, but you still had no way of confirming what you were hearing. Were your eyes just… adjusting? 

“Make yourself useful and figure out how to get more light in here, she can’t see anything,” Fennec’s unmistakeable lilt snarked, and with an amused grunt fading away with matching footsteps, you knew she’d thrown her jab at Boba. Yes, more light. That’s all you needed, everything was going to be alright. 

“Talk to me, how do you feel?” Din said above you, and you realized you hadn’t acknowledged him in your confusion. You made an effort to use your vocal cords, a few experimental groans coming out before you could manage any words. 

“I feel… tired.” You heard a quiet, shaky laugh come out from under Din’s helmet, and it didn’t take much longer before you felt the familiar Beskar of his helmet on your forehead. You steadily lifted one of your arms to reach for him, your body still coming back to temperature, and he met you halfway. If your eyes weren’t already closed, they were now as you savored the feeling of his hand in yours, how irrationally warm it made you feel to have Din wrapped so tightly around you. 

You heard Fett’s distant sound of triumph and a sputtering of electrical devices in the room around you. When Din slowly lifted his helmet, you attempted to open your eyes one more time. 

“There she is,” Fennec sighed, and your stomach flipped. “How’s the light, is that a little bit better?” She asked gently. 

You still couldn’t see anything. 

“Mesh’la… what’s wrong?” Din’s voice was quiet, smooth. Like he was trying to keep himself calm in order to comfort you. “Hey, look at me, I’m right here.” Your heart jumped to your throat, your head beginning to spin when you thought about how impossible such a simple task sounded when all you could see was black. 

“I… I can’t,” you whispered, unable to stop the quiver as you finished speaking, the panic starting to set in. You didn’t know where you were trying to go but your body went into overdrive, legs scrambling for some kind of leverage to sit yourself up. Before you could go far, Din’s hand squeezed yours a little tighter, the arm wrapped around you firm as he pulled you into a sitting position while keeping you curled up against his chest. 

“You can’t what?” Din’s voice was too calm, it was unsettling. Usually knowing that he was able to keep his calm in a less-than-ideal situation would be comforting to you, encouraging you to do so yourself and realize that you were okay. But it had never been this bad before. He wasn’t going through what you were. It was easy for him to find his calm, he could still see. 

“The bounty… what happened? What did he do to me?” You settled for, working yourself up as your brain reeled for an answer, an explanation, any morsel of a solution. 

“Easy princess,” Boba said from across the room. “Take it one step at a time, comin’ outta Carbonite isn’t as easy as taking a clam from a Gungan.” 

Carbonite… you could vaguely piece together a memory of fighting. Some slimy bounty you and Din had picked up as a side job on your way to Tatooine to visit with your friends in Mos Espa. What was supposed to be a standard grab-and-go mission had turned complicated fast. 

“You held your own,” Din’s voice said above you, no doubt watching you try to remember. “He caught us by surprise and managed to kick you back into a carbonite freezer. There was no way you could’ve seen him coming.” 

As he said it, the memories came back to you. Stalking around a dark warehouse beside your Mandalorian, lights scanning for any sign of movement. You’d heard a clang come from beside you, and before you could alert your partner that you were going to check it out, you’d been knocked against a metal container. You were able to process hissing sounds as your head stopped spinning, and as you shouted back out to Din, you watched him tearing to get to you before everything went cold. 

“How… how long was I in there?” you tried quietly. 

“A few hours at the most,” Fennec answered. “Mando reached out to us pretty quickly, and as Daimyo of Mos Espa, getting clearance wasn’t an issue. When we got there, Djarin was rooted to the spot next to you with a dead Trandoshan not too far off.” 

“We thought it’d be best if we defrosted you here at the palace,” Boba chimed in. “Give you time to acclimate without rushing you outta there.” Then there was a familiar gurgle, small noises that went directly to your heart. “And give the little one a chance to run around.” 

“But he’s been too worried about you to go anywhere,” Din reasoned softly. It was hard to tell if your eyes were still open, but you could feel the tears coming nonetheless at the thought of Grogu waiting patiently beside you. 

“Can I..” You wanted to ask if you could see him, but that seemed like a redundant question. “Where is he?” You heard the hesitant thump of Boba’s boots against the metal floor as he approached you. 

“Hold out your hands, mesh’la,” Din urged, releasing your hand while keeping you close. You did as he said, and before you could ask why, you felt a familiar weight being set in your arms. 

There were little hands on your cheeks and Grogu’s familiar gurgle of attempted words that were usually matched with his little toothy grin… What little restraint you had was shattered, and you felt the tears welling up in your eyes, and start to roll down your cheeks where they collided with your foundling’s fingers. Din pulled you closer as you cried, and you curled into him with Grogu in tow. 

“Why can’t I see, Din?” you whispered, and you heard how broken your voice sounded. It at least matched the way you felt; broken. 

“Carbonite takes its toll,” Boba started, and you felt Din’s body make a small, quick movement. You could only guess that he’d snapped his head up at the daimyo’s dramatic choice of words. “I just mean that there are usually side effects… but I’ve seen people come outta carbonite after weeks and turn out just fine.” 

“So… how long will it take me to get my vision back?” you choked, trying to put a stop to the stream of emotions that continued falling as you listened around you. Din’s leather-clad hands rubbing soothing patterns into your back was definitely helping on that front. “If I get it back.” 

“Don’t say that,” your Mandalorian’s firm voice countered. “You weren’t in there long. Your body will recover.” 

“He’s right,” Fennec piped up. Not being able to see where your party stood in the room was proving to be a strange sensation, figuring out where the speaker was in the room proving to be its own mental sport. “Unfortunately, there’s no way to tell when it will wear off. Carbonite affects everyone differently, so we could be waiting a few hours, a few days, a few weeks... It depends on how your body reacts.” 

There was a heavy silence in the room as Fennec’s words settled, forcing you to come to terms with the reality of the situation, and how little you could plan around it. 

Din, surprisingly, was the first to break the silence. 

“I’ll be here by your side each step of the way,” he started, his serious tone reassuring, backing up the weight of his promise.

Unsurprisingly, Din kept his word. 

In the days that followed, Din was with you every moment possible. He was there to help you up in the mornings, tender touches and slow movements in the private quarters your clan of three took up in the palace. His hands rarely left you as he helped you maneuver around the space, and had endless amounts of patience as you worked together to get through the day. 

Grogu definitely took a little bit to adjust. He was used to you picking him up and smothering him in affection too many times throughout the day to count. Now you often felt him at your feet, making soft sounds as he asked for you to lift him up. But when he started to understand that you couldn’t see him, his response broke your heart. 

Each morning Din would put Grogu in your arms, and without fail, those little hands would find your cheeks right before you would feel a strange sensation course through your body… He was trying to use his powers to heal you, much like you had seen him do with Din in the past. You wouldn’t let him do it for so long that he would tire himself out, but the two of you entertained his efforts – at the very least to make him feel better, but also to see if it would even work. 

In staying by your side, Din took to showering with you, too. Trying to convince him you could handle it was followed immediately by fumbling with the soaps until they clattered to the floor, and Din was knocking on the fresher door in moments. It was kind of amusing, at first, when he would step in behind you and you could hear the clang of the water against his helmet. 

Amidst the confusion and the disorientation of your lack of sight, the silver lining had been the day Din fully realized how much he could get away with when you couldn’t see him. Your entire relationship you kept your eyes shut tight – or left the room altogether – when Din removed his helmet, honoring his creed. But now he could go without it whenever he so chose… as long as it was in the confines of your room. 

Waking up to his soft kisses had been a warm welcome, one that was met with his enthusiastic affection scattered across your face. “We should do this more often,” he sighed, making you laugh against him as he kissed your cheek, the scratch of his facial fair tickling your skin. 

You grew accustomed to roaming your hands around his body so you could navigate to his soft curls, combing through his hair and massaging his scalp with your nails. You mapped the planes of his face with your lips, traced his pouted ones with your fingertips… and by the Maker, you were basking in the sound of his voice without the vocoder filtering it through his helmet. You could hear his smile when he spoke, could hear even the smallest huff of amusement his helmet usually kept from being audible, and his comforting tone wrapped you in a warmth you wanted to stay in forever. 

…

“Mesh’la,” you heard as you slowly came into consciousness. You gave Din a sleepy smile as he peppered kisses over your cheeks, the scratch of his mustache tickling your skin. “Someone’s here to see you early this morning,” he whispered, and you felt his side of the bed shift as he sat up. You kept your eyes closed through the whole process, like you did every morning, wanting to soak up the softness of your little family for just a little bit longer before facing the disappointment of not being able to see anything. 

In the last week, there was… some improvement. You knew you should be grateful for any steps forward your condition was taking, even if they were slim, but after the first few days, it just became exhausting. You could make out the vague shapes of the figures around you, and you could tell the difference between light and dark, but that was about it. Din had been ecstatic when you reached out for him that first morning, his excitement growing each time you turned towards him as he leaned in to give you a kiss. 

You just wanted to see again. 

When Din’s weight returned to the bed – your eyes still closed – he brought with him a familiar bundle that was set directly on your stomach. Grogu didn’t wait for your hands to find him before he was crawling clumsily up your body, and you shared in Din's laughter as you each gave him a hand to help him to his destination. 

“Well good morning to you too, little one,” you smiled, pleasantly surprised by your foundling’s newfound eagerness to get started with the day. “You must be hungry if you’re wanting to get this over with so quickly.” There was only a babble in response as he situated himself on your chest, and you could just imagine him reaching his little hands out to make it to your cheeks without losing his balance.

Din grunted as he shifted, this time getting up off of the bed, no doubt to go tend to make Grogu something to eat before it got past the point of no return. And yet, when his little hands finally reached you, there was no urgency. With your eyes still closed, you focused closely on the feeling that began spreading through your body, breathing deeply when the familiar feeling of weightlessness his powers brought you relaxed your muscles. 

The soft clanking of dishes from the living area of your room in the palace brought you back to the present, which meant that it was time to start moving through your day, and giving Grogu a chance to rest after using his powers once again. You opened your eyes as you sat up, hoisting Grogu up with you and returning the little smile that spread across his cheeks…

His smile. You could see it. 

You could see.

“Hi baby,” you whispered, your throat suddenly feeling very constricted as you took in the sight of your foundling. His big, dark eyes bore into you as his ears perked up at the attention he hadn’t seen from you in so long. He gurgled happily as he used his grip on your cheeks to encourage you to lean forward, pressing his little forehead against yours. 

You heard Din’s broken voice say your name, speaking softly as if he was scared to break whatever trance he was in. Without thinking, you lifted your head from Grogu’s and turned to look in his direction, and for a moment you couldn’t believe what you were seeing. 

Din stood frozen in place when he met your gaze, his warm brown eyes speaking a thousand words that would never pass his lips. His dark curls that you had felt so many times sat in a mess atop his head, matching the scruff and facial hair that decorated his golden skin. The prominent nose you had felt was more handsome than you could have ever imagined, the pouty pink lips you had traced time and time again as inviting as ever. 

You had imagined this moment a thousand times, thought of every possible situation or turn of events that might ever lead to seeing your Mandalorian without his helmet. Your worst fear was that it would be an accident – like it was now – and that his expression turning into disappointment, anger, or something worse that would mean he wanted nothing more to do with you. 

But the face looking back at you had nothing but anticipation and adoration written across his striking features. 

“Mesh’la…” you whispered, trying the Mando’a endearment on your tongue. The corners of his lips began to turn up in a tentative smile, and the sight you had just gotten back started to blur with the water flooding your eyes. “Beautiful… Din, you’re beautiful,” you sobbed. The last thing you saw was Din rushing to your side, quick to wrap his arms around you and kiss the top of your head as you closed your eyes once more, letting the happy tears flow freely across your cheeks.