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There was a suit of Mandalorian armor outside the Temple.
Obi-Wan had been going to the lower levels to consult with Dex before his mission when he saw the pile of armor. The gleam of the metal was familiar enough—he’d seen plenty of Mandalorians during his time protecting Satine. But he realized, with a bit of confusion, that he had never actually seen Mandalorian armor lying on the ground like this, unworn. He’d always seen it intact and on a body.
There was nobody around the armor—nobody standing guard over it, or keeping an eye on it. It was simply sitting just outside the steps to the Temple, and Obi-Wan stared at it some more before he shrugged and began to pile the pieces in his arms.
It was surprisingly lighter than he’d expected. He dropped it off in his quarters and made a note to let the guards know about the armor he’d found, and then continued to Dex’s Diner and his mission. He successfully negotiated a treaty on the Mid Rim without getting shot at, and was quite pleased with himself as he returned to the Temple and entered his quarters—
There was a man, very naked, sitting at the low table with one of his mugs in hand. The man looked up as the door swung open. “Finally. What took you so long?”
The man’s name was Jango, and he was a Mandalorian.
“You took my armor,” Jango said, pleasantly, as he turned the pieces over as he checked for any scuffs. “Brought it into your home. Didn’t hide it very well, though.”
“Of course not,” Obi-Wan murmured, still a little dazed. For one thing, he was pretty sure that the Temple was secure, and yet here Jango was, sitting in his quarters looking perfectly at home. Secondly, Jango had not put on any clothes, still. Obi-Wan was used to naked bodies—he had grown up in the communal environment of the creche—but there was still something jarring about a complete stranger, naked, in his quarters. “What do you mean, hide it?”
Jango eyed him. “It’s my armor,” he said, slowly.
“I know it’s valuable,” Obi-Wan offered. The Mandalorians he met in Mandalore were all very determined to keep their armor on, as if they were worried it would be spirited away the minute a piece was taken off. “But the Temple is perfectly safe, and somebody would have given it back if you’d asked. I made sure to let the guards know—”
“It’s a good thing,” Jango interrupted, “that you’re pretty.”
Obi-Wan spluttered back.
“Do you really not know?”
Obi-Wan knew that Mandalorians never took their armor off in front of others. He knew that they guarded their armor, with an almost fanatical jealousy. He knew that a Mando’s armor was one of the most precious items that a Mando could own, that to lose it was to lose their life, that—
“You took my armor,” Jango said, “hid it—”
“It wasn’t hidden.”
“—and that means that now I stay with you.”
A Mandalorian’s armor was their life.
Literally. A Mandalorian was born with their armor, grew with it. It was a part of them, a tie that wound so deep in their soul that they could not bear to be separated from it. They were their armor. A Mandalorian without armor did not exist, because when the armor came off, then they were Human, Twilek, Pantoran, any species, but they were not Mandalorian.
“Like Selkies,” Obi-Wan, who was very well-read and know much about legends and lore and the different species of the Galaxy, said slowly. “Seals that shed their skin to walk among the humans.”
And a Mandalorian was tied to their armor. If another took their armor, kept it, hid it, then they would stay. They would stay, and stay, for as long as their armor remained hidden.
Jango sprawled on Obi-Wan’s couch. “You took my armor,” he said. “You kept it. You hid it.”
Obi-Wan eyed the armor, lying before them on the coffee table. He couldn’t really argue with the took part of that statement, the kept part was fairly questionable, but there really was nothing to be said for the “hid” part. There was no part of the armor that was hidden, it was all in front of them, laid bare.
“And now I’ll stay.”
Obi-Wan eyed Jango, looking perfectly comfortable. “Are you sure you don’t want to just take your armor and go your own way?”
Jango crossed his bare arms in front of his chest.
“Right.” Obi-Wan said, “Let’s start with some clothes.”
Jango was remarkably accommodating, though he never put on his armor, keeping it neatly stacked in a pile in Obi-Wan’s closet.
“You really should get a proper lock for it,” Jango suggested.
“I’m not keeping it from you,” Obi-Wan replied. “You can take it and leave whenever you want.”
“Hm,” he replied, but he didn’t move from where he was in Obi-Wan’s kitchenette, fussing over tea. He’d been fussing over the tea for a while now, and Obi-Wan wasn’t sure if he was ever going to get a cup, or if he would have to pry Jango from the kitchen so he could make his own tea.
Jango was remarkably stubborn about some things. Insisting that Obi-Wan had hidden his armor was one. Trying to be a house-husband was the other. Jango insisted on cooking (Obi-Wan tried to point out that there was a refectory that he usually ate at, with his age-mates other Jedi), cleaning (Obi-Wan usually had to dust again, after Jango managed to make his rooms even more messy than they were before), and reorganizing (Obi-Wan still wasn’t sure why the teacups were now in the bathroom cabinet).
It was rather confusing. Obi-Wan had spent a year among Mandalorians, after all, and he knew how they tended towards violence. Jango certainly didn’t seem any different, considering he had over a dozen weapons secreted in his armor that he meticulously took out everyday to clean and maintain before putting them back in the closet. But Jango seemed perfectly content to walk around in nothing but one of Obi-Wan’s tunics and a pair of leggings, fussing over tea and spreading dust everywhere as he moved Obi-Wan’s possessions from one drawer to another without rhyme or reason.
“Exactly how long are you planning on staying?” Obi-Wan asked, as he found his toothbrush in his bedside drawer. “And where’s the toothpaste?”
Jango poked his head out from the kitchenette. He had the toothpaste in his hand. He didn’t break eye contact as he stalked forward to take Obi-Wan by the wrist, to turn his hand gently until the toothbrush in Obi-Wan’s hand rested, bristles up, to press a dollop to the bristles and then step back.
“Why is the toothpaste in the kitchen?”
Jango sniffed, turning back to fuss over the dishes, which was only a tea set, since they had eaten at the refectory as usual. “Where else would it be?”
“Right.” He decided some things didn’t need to be answered, and stepped into the fresher to brush his teeth.
That night, as he laid in bed and Jango calmly rose from where the sofa was made up for him to sleep in to crawl next to him, he asked, again, “How long are you planning on staying, Jango?”
“As long as you keep my armor,” he replied.
“Is this really what you’re going to do?” Obi-Wan asked, as he looked for his socks. They were in the kitchen, now. “Cook and clean and move my stuff around?” This morning, Jango had served hot tea with beskar straws for them to drink with. Obi-Wan had decided not to ask where he’d gotten straws made out of beskar.
“You have my armor,” Jango replied, as he rummaged around in the fresher. “I’m stuck here with you.”
Obi-Wan looked at the breastplate sitting on the kitchenette counter, where Jango had been doing… some sort of maintenance. “Right,” he said. “But don’t you want to do anything else?”
Jango stuck his head out of the fresher, eyes narrowed.
“It’s got to be boring, stuck in here all day.”
“Usually, people who have a Mando’s armor don’t like it when they leave.”
“Right,” Obi-Wan said, trying to remember if he’d heard about any of this from his time on Mandalore. “But I don’t mind. You don’t have to stay here all day. You can… go for walks, and come back.”
Jango blinked at him.
And, before he could quite comprehend the words coming out of his mouth, he said, “Or you could come with me on my mission.”
“What’s your mission?”
Obi-Wan blinked. “Border dispute in the Mid-Rim.”
Jango’s eyes narrowed. “Sounds dangerous.”
“It really shouldn’t be.”
“It really wouldn’t do if you got hurt and weren’t able to protect my armor.”
Obi-Wan wasn’t sure when the narrative had changed from him hiding Jango’s armor to him protecting it, but he supposed that hiding was a form of protection. From a certain point of view.
“I suppose I’ll have to make sure you stay safe.” Jango very deliberately swept out of the fresher and began to collect the various pieces. “When are we leaving?”
“Look,” Obi-Wan said, after their fourth border dispute ended in a shootout. “I didn’t want to bring this up earlier, but perhaps you should know. Aggressive negotiations are a last resort.”
“You were in danger.”
“I was fine,” Obi-Wan said. And he had been, until Jango had drawn his blasters, and the situation escalated out of control. Obi-Wan was sent on diplomatic missions for a reason. “Violence isn’t always the solution.”
Jango frowned at him, skeptically.
“How about next time, you follow my lead, and don’t draw your weapons so quickly. Then we can reevaluate.”
Jango, still frowning skeptically, agreed. And it was a very pleasant tea ceremony on Chal Hudda, where Obi-Wan helped determine what the Chalhuddans needed from the trade agreement that was being drawn up with neighboring planets, and helped all of the parties involved come to an appropriate compromise with no weapons were drawn, and Jango frowned at the tea for a very long time.
Jango was still frowning at him as they returned to the Temple. But the next time they went out, he let Obi-Wan talk his way through several cultural ceremonies and a trade negotiation without drawing his blaster. And again, and again, Jango followed Obi-Wan to the far reaches of the galaxy, and did not draw his weapon once.
He took off his armor whenever they returned to the Temple, stacking it inside the box that Obi-Wan had settled in their closet, and stopped reorganizing their rooms, letting Obi-Wan put his socks in the dresser and the toothpaste back in the fresher. He still clattered around in the kitchenette, and served tea with beskar straws.
“You know you can leave, right?” Obi-Wan asked, after they returned from another mission and Jango made angry faces at the kitchen and then furiously spread the layer of dust that had settled when they were out. “You don’t have to stay.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Jango replied. “Luminara is coming over in an hour to try the new tea blend you got in Mirial, and you still need to hide my armor.”
Luminara, like all of their friends in the Temple, had seen Jango both in and out of his armor, but Jango did insist that Obi-Wan hide it still, every time they had guests over, so Obi-Wan took the pile from Jango and—while Jango closed his eyes and very loudly banged pots and pans in the kitchen (literally, with a wooden spoon)—went to put them away in the closet.
So Jango stayed, and stayed. He got better at cooking, though they still went to the refrectory most days to eat with the other Jedi. He served tea with beskar straws, no matter what temperature. He stayed as Obi-Wan went on missions, he stayed as Obi-Wan took a padawan, he stayed as Obi-Wan became a master and was appointed to the Council.
And, every night, as Obi-Wan settled into bed and Jango slipped in beside him, Jango pointed out, “You probably should hide my armor better.”
“Don’t need to,” Obi-Wan would reply, as he closed his eyes and let their breaths settle into unison. “I trust you to stay.”