Wanted to try for something that could pass as a canon omake this time around plus shake off some of that rust my writing hand has accumulated.
Gunrunners and Pacifists Don't Mix
"Girls." Jango Fett shook his head as entered his office the cloners' odd hiccup still fresh on his mind. "Well, at least the boys won't be as awkward around women they get older."
Jango couldn't help but smile at the mental image of a bunch of flustered clones trying to deal with some of the more
picturesque Jedi. Jango didn't consider the greater bulk of the clones to be his sons — or now daughters — but that just meant that they were his juniors and it was the duty of any old timer to have fun at the expense of the young bloods.
Expansion was going steadily. Cloning could have gone better but given the circumstances it was understandable that there were going to be delays. Still annoying. The good doctor was making good progress on the genetic improvements and they had finally settled on a curriculum for the verd'ika for when they got old enough to start asking questions like 'where do we come from?' and what is a 'chakaaryc and why is Deathwatch full of them?'
Stepping around his flimsi covered desk, Jango sank into the luxury office chair he had bought specifically with Sith funds and let the stress of the day fade away. Thoughts of working on paperwork were dismissed with a lightly muttered, "Later."
At some point Jango managed to fall asleep, a fact that he was made aware of when he was woken up by the chiming of his office holocomm. Once he was aware of what was happening Jango quickly accepted the call. To the front Jango's desk the life size hologram of a Pantoran man dressed in supercommando armor sprang into existence.
"Jango," greeted the man before taking a single look at Jango and giving him an amused smirk. "You fell asleep didn't you?"
"Roh'j. How'd the talks go?" Jango asked.
"Eh." The Mandalorian on the other side shook his hand 'so-so'. "Not great. I've got good news and bad news."
"Start with the bad news."
"Concordia Crescent Technologies is about get an export ban."
Jango cursed. "Why?"
"Politics, what else?" Roh'j answered. "The New Mandalorians aren't comfortable with the idea of being arms dealers, not that they're going so far as to getting rid of their weapons. They're not that far gone."
"Do we have to go looking for a new supplier?"
"No. Remember that good news I mentioned?" Roh'j paused for Jango to nod. "Well the folks here at Concordian were very excited to hear about our offer and it's more or less convinced them to fight the ban."
"They were going to let it go through?"
"Yeah, according to one of the suits I talked to exports don't account for much in their yearly profits." Roh'j shrugged. "The way she explained it to me it makes sense. Most planetary security forces out there are worried about volume, so when they go shopping for weapons they go with the lowest bidder. Concordian Crescent Technologies isn't that. So when the New Mandalorians started talk about introducing an export ban on Mandalorian arms manufacturers, Concordian didn't pay the bill much attention other than going over it to make sure the Ruling Council wasn't using it as a smoke screen to sneak in something else."
"I can see that," said Jango as he was hit by memories of his days back with Jaster and the rest of the True Mandalorians. How often had they had to settle for lesser equipment? How many times had they had to husband their credits to be able to afford replacement blasters let alone good ones?
"Anyhow I let slip that we would be interested in negotiating for a bigger contract later on. And I also hinted at the possibility of licensing their designs to manufacture locally."
"They didn't need to know that."
"There's some things we can't lie about Jango or would you rather deal with a Mandalorian legal team?"
Jango sighed. "Just try not to tell them everything. Was there anything else?"
"No, that's it for the moment. I'll call when I get more news on the ban."
After saying their goodbyes Jango hung up and sank back into his chair with an annoyed crease of his brow. This was turning out to be a year of complications. Seconds later Jango's comms beeped again. When he accepted the call Jango found himself looking up at the impassive face of Count Dooku. Stifling a groan Jango sat up, making a token effort to appear more presentable. Nothing more though because kriff the Sith.
⁓ / ⁓ / ⁓
"Good new and bad news," said Roh'j.
"Again," said Jango.
"Again," Roh'j repeated back.
"Bad news first, please."
"We're not getting carbines."
Jango's mind stuttered to a halt before abrubtly kicking into overdrive. Within the former bounty hunter's mind various plans on how to disappear with baby Boba were thought up in an instant and discarded the next. Slowly — in Jango terms at least — his initial panic subsided and the gears in Jango's head shifted away from thinking up ways to escape with his life to how he was going to deal with Concordian Crescent Technologies not being able to supply the army he was growing with a mainline blaster.
Roh'j waited patiently giving Jango all the time he needed to digest the bombshell. When he could see Jango had settled he continued his explanation. "The New Mandalorians got their chunk of flesh and sales of Concordian's GALAAR line is now restricted to offworlders. You can still get some if you come to Concordian's stores on Mandalore but you can only buy so many and definitely not in bulk. Concordian is looking for a way around the new restrictions but it's going to take a while."
"And the good news?" Jango asked with a sinking feeling.
"That's the only thing Concordian's been banned from selling."
"Wait..." Jango stared at Roh'j in confusion. "The GALAARs are the only thing they're banned from selling? Aren't the SHUKURs repeaters?"
"Yeah, I thought it was a little weird too but apparently the Ruling Council reasoned that light repeaters are more likely to be used in defensive situations." Roh'j expression showed how much he really bought into that explanation. "From what I've gathered this whole thing has really been about restricting Concordian's sales of GALAAR-15 carbines. Apparently the things have a knack for showing up on the black market and the New Mandalorians don't like such a distinct product of Mandalore being closely associated with criminal enterprises."
"Then this whole thing was to save face."
"Oh no, not entirely. I got to see part of the debate featuring Duchess Satine and let me tell you that woman was well and truly pissed." Roh'j shook his head. There was a degree of fondness in the Pantoran Mandalorian's gesture. "It's not difficult to see how she managed to beat Deathwatch."
"Good for her," Jango said with a hint of bitterness.
Roh'j audibly coughed. "The first shipment cleared customs a few hours ago and should be on its way. I'll let you know if anything else comes up."
Jango nodded and hung up.
⁓ / ⁓ / ⁓
Roh'j stood before Jango in the flesh. Rather than calling to make his latest status report the Pantoran had returned to Kamnio, bringing with him a number of blasters fresh from the labs of Concordian Crescent Technologies. Jango's desk was cleared of its usual stacks flimsi — Jango told himself he would get back to dealing with them later — and sitting in their place were said blasters laid out for the Mandalorian to inspect.
"That looks like a bigger SHUKUR-05," said Jango pointing to the heavy repeater at the center of his desk.
"That's because it is." Roh'j sounded amused.
"Huh. Does it work?"
"Mostly. They're still working out the kinks. Apparently there's more to this engineering business than making a blaster bigger and calling it a day. Who would have thought?" Roh'j paused and raised a finger. "But, this big 'un isn't what I wanted to show you. That is." Roh'j pointed to an unfamiliar blaster rifle on the far end of the table.
"And this is?" asked Jango as he examined the rifle. It was a blocky looking thing which thanks to its short stock had a sort of stubby appearance. To the front of its trigger guard was a distinctive circular component and on top of the rifle was an optic.
"This is our loophole." Roh'j gestured for Jango to pick it up. Jango did so and found himself a little surprised by the weapon's surprisingly light weight. "Allow me to introduce to you the WESTAR-M5 blaster rifle."
"WESTAR?" Jango took another look at the blaster in his hands. "This isn't a pistol."
"No, no it's not," Roh'j said with a grin. He began explaining the weapon's features starting by pointing to the fire selector. "Safe, semi-auto, full-auto, and burst fire modes." Roh'j grabbed the butt of the rifle's stock while pressing down on a mechanical button on the stock and pulled extending the stock out before it locked into place. "Fully adjustable shoulder stock." Next, Roh'j poked at the rifle's built in scope. "Variable magnification. And no it doesn't top off at 2x."
"Impressive." Jango shortened the stock before shouldering the rifle and aiming it at the wall. "Not bad at all."
"There's one last thing."
"Oh?"
Roh'j pulled out a small device which Jango quickly realized to be an grenade launcher. "Goes right under the barrel. Like so," Roh'j explained, snapping the device onto the rifle with ease. "As for payload there's the usual suspects but the Concordian rep told me if we're willing to pay for it they'd be able to get us more specialized ammunition."
Jango nodded in approval. The rifle was perfect, if not for one thing. "And what happens when the Duchess finds out?"
"She won't. Concordian is selling the M5 to us exclusively. No one outside of us knows what this even is. The name's certainly not going to give it away."
⁓ / ⁓ / ⁓
The hologram of Roh'j stood rubbing his face in frustration. "I don't suppose we could just kill her?"
"Roh'j!" Jango snapped.
"Sorry, that was in bad taste." The Pantoran sighed. "I'm just feeling strung out... not that that's any excuse."
"It's good that you recognize that. That last thing anyone needs is to for us to become into another Deathwatch."
Roh'j scoffed. "Well we're not exactly saints not with our pasts let alone the things we've done for this project."
"We may be damned but that's no excuse to be monsters."
"Aye, Mand'alor."
"Knock that off," Jango ordered with a glare. "When can we expect you back?"
"Give me a few weeks to try and work something out here."
⁓ / ⁓ / ⁓
"So we managed to make a deal to sneak out some blasters under the Duchess's nose. Not much, but this trip hasn't been a complete loss."
"How bad are things?"
"Not as bad as they could be. Concordian's not in as much hot water as they could have been but the way they threw off the heat might not be good for us."
"Wonderful, what did they do?"
"They pointed out that they can't be making blood money because no blood's been spilled." Roh'j made a complicated face. "They made a big point out of the fact that there's been no reports of Mandalorian arms being used in significant numbers in any recent galactic conflict nor have their arms been showing up in the hands of criminals, at least no more than there always have been. They were rather smug about it too. The trouble is the Duchess is a smart cookie. She's seen how much Concordian has been putting out and I'm sure she's noticed that it's been increasing every year. The obvious question she's going to ask is what hole those blasters are disappearing into."
"That..." That was far from good news. While Concordian had deflected a lethal shot it had done so by throwing them in front of the shooter. "Can you stall her investigation?"
"I'd rather not go anywhere near her right now," Roh'j said shaking his head. "If she so much as catches a whiff that something's up she's going to come down hard. I heard she's friends with a Jedi."
That was definitely the kind of attention they couldn't afford. "Understood. Do you need to get offworld?"
"Maybe." Roh'j shrugged. "It might be a good idea but I've been seen enough times coming and going that my disappearing could cause trouble."
"I'll leave it to your discretion then."
"Sure thing." Roh'j paused in thought. "I hate to admit it, but the Duchess, she's been good for Mandalore. I remember when we first arrived to talk with Concordian, you could still see the scars left over from the clan wars. Now though, you can barely see any signs that this place had ever gone through a war. It makes me wonder you know."
'What things might have been like if you had stayed Mand'alor,' went the unasked question.
"If we're lucky the realists on the Ruling Council will step in and have the Duchess back off," said Roh'j. "We've been spending a lot of credits on Concordian and that's been helping fund the reconstruction effort. Not to mention all the spending Concordian's been doing themselves."
"Hopefully. Anything else to report?" Jango asked.
"That's it."
"Alright, stay safe."
"You too Jango."
So according to Wookieepedia WESTARs and GALAARs aren't allowed to be sold outside of Mandalore. Rather than ignoring that bit of trivia I worked that into the export ban that Jango and friends just managed to get in ahead of. Those politics also provided me an excuse, however flimsy, to introduce the WESTAR-M5 as a product of Concordian Crescent Technologies.
This omake may or may not have been an elaborate scheme on my part to have said blaster be the primary rifle of the Grand Army of the Republic. Also decided to write Roh'j as a Pantoran foundling because everyone seems to forget Mandalorians are supposed to include more than just humans.
I'm personally a big fan of how Mandalore ended up becoming the producer of small arms for the future Grand Army of the Republic in this quest. The potential butterflies from that one decision alone are wonderful. When the Clone Wars do begin Mandalore will be unable to be a neutral world as it was in canon given how critical it will become to the war effort. The Separatists will want to attack it while the Republic will need to defend it. The various worlds that aligned with Mandalore during the war to stay neutral will have to find some alternative or join a side this time around. Deathwatch will have that much of a harder time to demonize the occupying Republic forces when they identify so heavily as Mandalorians.