Chapter 3: This is the Way

Concept art by Christian Alzmann showing Cara Dune and Din Djarin meeting Kuiil outside of his dwelling on Arvala-7. Image from The Mandalorian, Season 1, Episode 7, The Reckoning. Calendar by DateWorks.

Grogu had just finished drawing a fairly detailed plan of the house that his friend Kuiil had built on Arvala-7 when his dad came into the cabin. Din Djarin had been updating some sensors on the N-1 to make sure it couldn’t be tracked by anyone. Grogu appreciated that. They had been tracked too many times and it never ended well for whoever was doing the tracking and it certainly had proved annoying to his dad. 

“What do you have there buddy?”

Grogu held up the drawing and smiled at his dad. He was sure the Mandalorian would recognize the layout. 

“That’s Kuiil’s place? Nice job, Grogu. The proportions are a little off, but otherwise you really captured the essence of the place.”

Grogu sighed. The Mandalorian always said that. The same response to every drawing presented. ‘That’s Blah blah blah? Nice job, Grogu. The proportions are a little off, but otherwise you really captured the essence of the ‘insert name here’.” It was like he didn’t even really look at them. 

Take this picture for instance, how could the proportions be off? It was a layout. A floor plan. Grogu had set a scale and followed it. The distances were correct. He’d checked with the vids he retrieved from IG-11’s memory card. Not IG-12’s memory card. That had been part of the whole ‘new to them’ data set they had obtained from that other IG-11 ‘head’. 

Grogu had managed to keep the old parts without letting his dad know about it. He didn’t need Din Djarin getting all dramatic about the potential problems with having an assassin droid’s main circuits laying around. He’d hear about how the Frog lady had managed to rewire the vocabulator from that other bounty hunting droid. How anyone could get into the cabin, do the same thing and create a dangerous droid that could put the whole of Nevarro at risk, but especially Grogu. 

Grogu knew that his dad was still mad at himself for not having the patience that Kuiil had when the Ugnaught had originally reprogrammed and trained the former assassin droid. He could understand that, more or less. For a trained bounty hunter, the Mandalorian wasn’t really very patient at all. 

He was very good at doing research, collecting background information, sifting through intelligences reports (e.g. gossip), and formulating an implementation plan. He was regarded as the best bounty hunter in the Outer Rim for a reason. But Grogu had come to learn that exactly one and half milliseconds after that plan was formulated, Din Djarin was executing it.  No testing. No review period. No ‘Let’s sleep on it’. Nope. Just go, go, go. 

That was fine until it wasn’t fine. When it wasn’t fine, well, bad things happened. 

Grogu sighed. All he had wanted to do was draw out that plan and see if it could be modified so that he and his dad could build out a place that was bit more Grogu sized. Kuiil had been substantially shorter than the Mandalorian and for Grogu’s purposes that was great. 

Humans scaled things to their own comfort all the time. Grogu just wanted something that catered a little bit more to his needs and that his dad could still manage without hitting his head on things. Grogu had originally considered patterning his dwelling after the ones the Anzellans’ used, but that had been a tight space even for him. Then he thought Kuiil and it was pretty obvious that he and his dad could handle that, just like that had the times they had visited the handy Ugnaught at his ranch. 

Now he’d have to explain that all to his dad, show him the scale he’d used in the drawing, explain why he wanted a place of his own and then listen to a whole long explanation for what they couldn’t do it. Dank Farrik.

“Hey, buddy, why don’t you come with me and I’ll show you what I’ve been working on?”

Uff. Din Djarin was going to bore him to tears with an explanation of how he installed those updated sensors. Dang. 

Grogu looked up at the Mandalorian and realized that he couldn’t just beg off and that he was starting to lose feeling in his legs from the seat he had been using when he was working on his plans. He nodded his head reluctantly, picked up the drawing, and hopped to his tingly feet. Yikes! He hated that. 

Grogu followed his dad out of the cabin and was really studying his drawing when he heard his dad clear his throat. The Mandalorian never did that unless he wanted Grogu’s undivided attention.

“Eh?” Grogu asked as he looked up at his dad. 

“What do you think? I thought I’d make a few adjustments to your plan.”

Grogu looked around and began to laugh. Dank Farrik! His dad hadn’t been messing around with the N-1 at all! He’d been working on marking out an addition to the cabin. A Grogu sized addition! That sneaky Mandalorian. 

“It’s just a rough idea. Nothing as complete as that layout you’ve put together, but I thought you might like to see it and then we could work on it together.”

Grogu was speechless. Well, except for one line that he knew his dad would like. 

“This is the Way.”