Chapter 1: Problem Solvers

Cad Bane, standing on a street in Mos Espa, facing Boba Fett in full armor. Image from The Book of Boba Fett, Season 1, Episode 7, In the Name of Honor. Calendar from DateWorks.

Grogu had never met Cad Bane. He wasn’t really sorry about that. Sometimes you hear about a person who was very important to a friend or mentor and you think, ‘Wow, I wish I knew them too’. That was the not the case for Cad Bane. 

Grogu had asked Daimyo Fett how he’d met the Duros bounty hunter and the older man hemmed and hawed and finally Fennec Shand replied for him. 

“He was unlucky.”

That pretty much settled the matter. Grogu knew that Fennec had no love lost for Fett’s one time teacher, but since the Daimyo nodded at her words, Grogu learned all he wanted to know. He’d met and spent time with people who had ended up being less a friend and more an enemy over time. He didn’t recommend it. You never really questioned why they turned out to be so awful, but you asked yourself why you didn’t see through it all much sooner. 

Grogu might have said that Dr. Pershing was a person like Cad Bane. He was obsessed with what he wanted and thought he was doing the right thing and pursued it pretty relentlessly. But it had all failed and Grogu was happy about that. 

Fennec told him that Pershing was nothing like Cad Bane. 

“Coruscant is riddled with people like that. All hoping that if they could only get the attention of the people in power, they could achieve some ridiculous goal that no one else valued. The people in power called Cad Bane in to do the work that they were afraid to do themselves. Bane wasn’t afraid of anything and that’s why the Daimyo is here and Bane is buried in the bantha paddock.”

Grogu was surprised at that. He didn’t know why, but it seemed pretty odd. 

“That’s where I put all the… stuff I don’t want people like your pal Pershing to use for cloning projects. Trust me, if I’d had my way, Moff Gideon would have never had another chance to go after you or your dad. He would have ended up as fertilizer for the rancor’s favorite plants.”

Wow. Grogu had always know that Fennec was a very straightforward person with great tactical skills and a first class strategic mind, but he forgot how nuanced she could be. She was kind of the opposite of Cad Bane. 

When he first met Fennec, Grogu was kind of worried about having another master assassin in his life. IG-11 had been very effective at that work and as person who generally thought that all life was good, it was quite a challenge to have friends who made a living at ending lives. Even if those people were volunteers according to his dad. 

But the more time he spent with Fennec, the more Grogu realized that she didn’t just end people. She solved problems. If she could do that without ending the person, then fine. Take those Nikto gang members. She didn’t pick them all off during some sort of clean up operation after they had dealt with the Scorpenek annihilator droids. She just got rid of the ring leaders and that sent a message more effectively than a complete blood bath would have. At least that’s what his dad told him. 

The Mandalorian was very impressed with the levels of restraint that Fennec had displayed. Considering the Mandalorian view of enemies, Grogu figured that Fennec had displayed the patience of a Jedi Master. 

“Buddy, I don’t think you want to tell her that. I’m not sure she reveres the Jedi as much as you do.”

But Din Djarin was wrong about that. Fennec had told him once that she never got involved in the problems that included the Jedi.

“Listen kid, the whole point of the work I do is to solve problems. If I’m not solving the problem, I don’t get paid. The whole point of the Jedi was to solve the same problems I was generally assigned to resolve, but they had access to weapons I could never bring to bear. There’s no such thing as a fair fight which is why I don’t take risks like that. The Jedi always had an advantage, so I found other problems to solve. That’s why I’m still here and a lot of other folks aren’t.”

Fennec hadn’t been smug about that either. She hadn’t pointed out that the Jedi had been almost entirely wiped out. She didn’t say ‘I told you so’ or anything like that. She had patted her midsection where her mods were and that’s what convinced Grogu that she and the Daimyo were nothing like Cad Bane. Boba Fett had gone out of his way to save her. And she had stuck around to help him solve problems on Tatooine. 

This was definitely the way.