Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but the truth in masquerade
(Byron, from 'Don Juan')

A creature made of metal and hate is stirring in its sleep.

It cannot move yet, not under its own power. It cannot react. It cannot protect itself from those who would harm it if they knew it existed; its armour is incomplete and its defence weaponry awaits further functionality testing. It cannot think, as the beings who serve it think.

All it can do is want. All it has is hunger.

Swarms of servants bring sacrifices from across the galaxy to the altar of its orbit. It eats Galen Erso’s genius and the work of Cassian Andor’s imprisoned hands. It eats ground-down Separatist armour and droids, crystals that the Jedi once treasured, ore from planets mined by the desperate bleeding hands and paws and teeth of the dispossessed, the blood of broken worlds. It grows stronger and stronger and still its hunger is not sated. It wants to eat all that’s ever been built and loved and breathe out dust.

If it could dream in the way that living things dream, it would dream of futures to come in which it is a finished thing, a powerful thing, gnawing up whole planets, spitting out the rubble of Alderaan’s bones. Here it is feared enough for waves of rebels to break themselves against its impermeable surface, hoping, desperate; and maybe one pilot will be lucky, and maybe they won’t.

But all these futures are things yet to come. For now, the creature sleeps. 

Morning reached the edges of the district quietly, the glow of the lights from the traffic lanes above still brighter than the pale dawn struggling to make headway in the sky.  The block of apartments near the senate plaza was half unoccupied that day and few of those who were in residence were stirring at such an early hour. From Mon’s apartment on one of the higher floors the only sound of the city waking was the clank and whirr of maintenance droids somewhere below. Erskin lay still and quiet, watching Mon sleep beside him. 

He always woke early when they stayed here. Sometimes he’d wake Mon too with soft kisses to her eyelids or her lips or her hands, some small fearful part of him still needing the reassurance it was really him she wanted when she opened her eyes, but more often these days he let her sleep until the alarm sounded. She needed the rest. She’d been so exhausted lately, so many things to do and so much weighing down her mind: more secrets, more burdens, more work, always more work. Even Perrin was getting concerned, and though Erskin didn’t particularly enjoy being the conduit for Perrin’s indirect questions - well surely it’s not that important, Erskin, can’t you talk some sense into her - he couldn’t blame the man for asking.

She was sleeping sound and deep this morning and he certainly wasn’t going to disturb her, but he had no intention of going back to sleep himself. Soon enough the day would begin and he’d be sharing her with her duties and her causes, with the Senate and with Chandrila, with Perrin, with the Rebellion, with all the other thousand things that pull and press on her from every direction. Of course - of course - he wouldn’t have it any other way than this because she wouldn’t be Mon any other way than this, but he treasured every moment he could get of these times when she was only his. 

Mon had had this apartment for years before Erskin had known her, a base near the Senate for late nights and early mornings when travelling back and forth to the Embassy would be too much. The first times he’d been here it felt small and impersonal and not much like anyone’s home but he’d fast come to learn that Mon here was at ease in a way he rarely got to see elsewhere, bare feet tucked up beside her on the sofa as they shared containers of garishly-coloured food from the all-night stalls that she’d never usually eat and talked like there wasn’t a whole galaxy’s fate hanging in the balance outside.

Here Mon would tell him stories about the past: playing cards with Jedi at Bail Organa’s parties, an evening when she and Padmé had slipped out from underneath the careful watch of guards and escorts to go out dancing somewhere they wouldn’t be recognised and come home drunk and happy in the early hours to find their disappearances already under investigation. She laughed like the past never usually made her laugh and he loved every moment of it. Yes he shared her bed here too and yes that was bliss, but it wasn’t the only thing he valued so much about being here with her.

The morning’s sessions were the final ones before the Senate broke for its winter recess (longer this year, yet again; Mon had been one of the senators who objected to the change but they’d been vastly outnumbered). After that Mon would be leaving for Alderaan with Bail Organa, with Perrin joining her later after some cruise which, from what Erskin could tell, consisted mostly of drinking and gambling and ill-advised company but would at least keep him out of the way of whatever Mon and Bail needed to discuss. Erskin would be staying on Coruscant, a rare span of time off duty that should really come as a relief -

But that was as far as his thoughts got him before a more pressing issue presented itself: one small, purple light blinking slowly in the next room, where his datapad lay in shadow on the desk.

His first reflex was a snap of annoyance. Didn’t Kleya ever sleep? But however much he might want to roll over and bury his face in Mon’s shoulder and shut the whole world out for a little while longer, he couldn’t ignore this. Mon could be in danger. Mon was always in danger.

He eased himself out of bed as quietly as he could manage, resisting the temptation to leave a kiss on her bare arm. Out in the main living space the floor was cold under his bare feet and the grey cast of shadows made everything seem blank and lifeless and unfamiliar. No lights on until he’d reached the other bedroom, though - she was too light a sleeper. This shouldn’t take too long and then he could be back in bed before she woke.

The smaller bedroom was his, or at least it was meant to be. Some of his clothes were neatly hung up on the rails behind the door, and the low shelf held a couple of holobooks he still hadn’t got round to finishing. It had been some time since he’d slept in the bed. He settled himself into the broad, comfortable span of the armchair and switched on the datapad.

As ever, the message waiting for him seemed innocuous enough. Unimportant, even; there were multiple others around it insisting more openly on his attention, demands for answers and lines and meetings secured before Mon left for Alderaan later today (the last batch passed along late last night by her diary secretary Hendri who’d added a quick ‘Sorry’). This message held no demands at all and made no claims to urgency, and was intended to go unnoticed.

 It looked like weather report from a scattering of places across the galaxy where Erskin had once lived. Heavy fog this morning, typical for the start of the airfish harvest season… Warm for the time of year. The lilies are already in flower… Mercurial winds have eased a little, though the coast outside the habitation shelter is still ruled off limits by lunar authorities. If anyone ever saw - if Mon ever asked - it would be a bit of nostalgia and nothing more, the sort of thing that might be homesickness if he’d ever lived in any of these places long enough to think of them as home. He’d spent so much of his childhood trailing across the galaxy that no-one would grudge him this one little lapse into sentimentality.

He knew the code for the message hidden within, though: a time and a place for a meeting. With Kleya, probably, although they didn’t specify; Luthen kept his distance from Erskin when the location was anywhere near the Senate. The time was early evening tonight, after Mon had already left, and that was a relief in itself - not just because he wouldn’t need to find a reason to be absent but because there couldn’t be any immediate danger if they were willing to wait. 

There, then. Done. He could put this meeting from his mind for now and ignore the sick, metal taste of what it might mean. Right now the only thing left to do was pull the bedsheets aside so it looked like he’d slept here and go back to Mon. He still had forty-eight minutes before her morning alarm would sound and he wasn’t going to waste a single one of them on whatever Kleya and Luthen might want. 

He tried his best not to disturb her when he got back to bed but she was already awake, greeting him with a drowsy smile. Really he should have been annoyed with himself for disturbing the rest she needed but he was so glad she was there, glad she was his even if only in this place and for this little span of time, that it spilled out of him in kisses trailed over her shoulder.

She laughed, a soft, easy sound. “Where were you?”

“Sorting out the bed in the other room.” 

“You worry too much.”

“No I don’t.” The cleaner droids shouldn’t tell tales but this building was full of senators and their staff and every so often a story slipped out. If anything, Mon wasn’t worried enough; on a world like Chandrila where marriage fastened together so much of its society and traditions (and money, and power,) having this revealed could cause her problems she really didn’t need. But she’d been taking far too many risks lately and she never did seem to care enough.

Erskin had wondered once or twice whether that was how he’d ended up sharing Mon’s bed in the first place. Maybe she wanted to do something careless and risky for no greater cause than her own desire; maybe he was a way to make everything else bearable. He wasn’t sure he particularly liked the idea however he formulated it. He certainly wasn’t going to ask. 

Now, here, he nuzzled into the curve of her neck and she stretched out under his arm, still warm and soft with sleep. “Stay here with me,” she said.

“Of course.” Her hair was so soft where it brushed his face. I love you, he thought, and wondered how it would feel to say aloud. 

He’d learned fast that the only way to keep this place the sanctuary it needed to be - that Mon needed him to be - was to keep a careful watch on his own thoughts, constantly cutting and pruning back any time they started to branch out beyond these walls. The future, the rebellion, Perrin, the money, Luthen and Kleya, anything Erskin might or might not feel about any of them and everything he wouldn’t let himself want, all of it - all  of it, always - stayed off limits when he was here in her bed. It wasn’t easy exactly but it was worth it a hundred times over for this.

She stroked the back of his hand. “I hope you’ve made some very relaxing plans for the time I’ll be away,” she said. 

“Sort of.”

“Sort of?” 

“In a way. After a fashion.” He drew himself up on one elbow to see her properly. “For a given value of -”

“Stop it.” She was smiling more now, so radiantly beautiful he could barely believe he got to see her like this at all. “You know what I mean. Tell me you’re meeting friends and going to concerts or learning to cook, or anything. Please.”

What she meant was I don’t want to think this has taken over all of your life, though they would both pretend that’s not the question. “Learning to cook?” he said instead with mock indignation. “I’m a very good cook already, thank you.“

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Really?”

“Yes!” He couldn’t help but laugh; she was so incredulous. “Really, yes. When we shared that apartment out in Sector Fifty-two that’s what got me off the chores rota.”

“How enterprising.” Her fingers played a pattern over the back of his hand again, coming to rest in the grooves of his own. “You’ve never made anything for me.”

He’d never even thought to suggest it. The embassy had its own chef and Mon had a constant string of invitations to restaurants and dinner parties, and what could he offer her against that? “I will when you’re back. Promise.” 

“I’ll hold you to that,” she said, draping an arm over the back of his neck and pulling him down to kiss her. 

Oh, he loved how easy and right this all felt now, long after the fevered, desperate urgency of their first time and the awkward strangeness that followed after that when he’d still been waiting for difficult conversations that never came. They didn’t talk about this; they didn’t need to. 

He loved this. He loved her. He loved the familiarity of the taste of her lips and the smell of her hair, loved knowing what she liked and how she liked it to be, loved how much he was enjoying learning more and more about that. And learning about himself, too - though he wasn’t inexperienced the past all seemed so distant now, a faded collage of girls from university and boys from work, and with Mon he’d discovered things like how much he liked to be gentle and soft and slow with her when she wanted him like that (not as often as he’d like but that didn’t matter, it just made it more wonderful when she did), how much he liked the way it felt when she said hands there or close your eyes. 

No time to remove her nightgown, not now, he’d have to stop kissing her and that simply wasn’t an option he was willing to consider. Instead he worked his way down to mouth at her breasts through the silk and the blue of her gown turned darker under his lips and his tongue in a way that made him want to drown in her. She was everything.

Before too much longer she’d rolled him on top of her and had him settled between her thighs, and he was inside her and moving she was making perfect, perfect little sounds with the rhythm of it and it felt so good, all just so good. There was no room left for anything else in the galaxy to matter. 

The location Kleya sent was one of the usual places, deep within the twisting dimly-lit display halls of an aquarium two districts over and fifty levels down. Erskin was there early but it wasn’t as if he had anywhere else to be that night, and so he watched the shoals of long, tendrilled shatterfish drifting past, turning their rows of bored-looking eyes to the few scattered spectators who passed by. It was always quiet here. The aquarium was usually close to empty at this time of day and the shatterfish weren’t the most popular of exhibits anyway, although he’d begun to develop a certain fondness for them by now out of familiarity alone.

He came to a place like this with his mother years ago when they first lived on Coruscant. Just her; his father was already gone by the earliest of Erskin’s memories, back to Chandrila and a scandal that his money could smooth down to minor social inconvenience. He remembered holding tight to her hand afraid of losing her in the dark corridors, and how they’d watched the corallite eels feed for what felt like hours.  

When Kleya finally arrived she was eating one of the petal-dough rolls they sold in the atrium, a bright pink creation twisted into an elaborate spiral and covered with powdered sugar. Between that and the half-dark and way the dappled light and shadow crossed her face he genuinely didn’t recognise her for a moment. “That looks hideous,” he said.

“Oh, you’re missing out. I’ve been looking forward to this all day.”

He didn’t believe that for a moment. There might be some other logic to it; she’d mentioned before the trick of having something distinctive about your appearance on the way into somewhere that could be easily disposed of on your way out, a good way to break the trail of anyone paying attention. Then again, there might not. It was always impossible to tell with Kleya what was part of a carefully devised disguise meticulously thought out to every single detail and what wasn’t, and he suspected she enjoyed watching him fail to work that out. 

“I don’t have anything new for you,” he said. 

“They left Coruscant as planned?”

“Yes.” He didn’t go into more detail than that, keen as ever to avoid saying a word about Mon that wasn’t either useful or required. It felt a little ridiculous of him to believe this was out of loyalty given he was here talking to Kleya about Mon in the first place but he still did. Maybe he was just humouring himself.

Now his eyes had adjusted to the dark he could see how much maintenance this place needed: shabby tiles, worn carpets, a feel of damp in the air that crawled under his clothes down to the skin beneath. 

He couldn’t quite tell whether he was imagining Kleya’s sigh, though usually he wasn’t. “You asked me to look into a recent situation for you,” she said. 

“You’ve found something? Did you find out -”

“Some information. Not enough yet.” The wrapper of her petal-dough roll rustled a little and he imagined her hand tensing, relaxing. 

That recent situation had been haunting him since he’d learned about it. Someone had gained access to a med centre where Mon was waiting for a routine appointment, someone with false identification and a pack of drugs that could, if administered in the right doses, cause agonising pain and a slow, awful death. 

But they hadn’t got to her. There had been a confrontation by the building’s security staff, nowhere near Mon and the intruder had been shot and killed in the escape. Erskin had no evidence they were even trying to get to her - District security had declared it an attempted drug theft and closed the case file, and Mon had told him to stop worrying about it, said they had enough very real troubles plaguing them without including everything else on Coruscant too. And Erskin had nodded and smiled and agreed, and then sent the code for meet me, soon to Kleya as soon as he was alone.

A year now of lying to Mon. Secret messages, meetings in places like this, knowing he was giving them information she wasn’t, knowing they were relying on him more and more because Mon trusted them less. It was the worst thing he’d ever done and he still couldn’t regret it, because Kleya hadn’t said I’m sure it’s fine. Kleya had agreed with him when all this started that if there was anything he felt wasn’t right they’d look into it for him based on that alone, and she’d kept her word. 

She summarised what they’d learned so far. Still no real identity to attach to the intruder, only a partial chain code, a rented apartment and a credit account; not even a name. But she had established that the chain code began with the same initial sequence as a batch sold off for illicit re-use four years ago and would not have been cheap to get hold of.

It was still cold here, a chill Erskin couldn’t quite shake no matter how he tried to ignore it. “Seems like a lot of effort to steal drugs from a med centre.“

“Indeed,” she said, and handed him a grainy readout. “So does this.”

This was a list of - payments? Transactions? Credits in and then credits withdrawn, always within a few hours, always in the same small, irregular amounts. “What’s… what am I looking at?”

“Our drug thief’s account, created earlier this year.”

“You’re carrying this around?” He’d never known her do that before. Too risky.

“It’s sonic-degradable, it’ll be blank as soon as you’re past the whirlpools in the next hall. I needed you to see it for yourself. Look at it. The code at the top there is the reference for the account, like the name they gave it when it was created.”

A string of digits and a single word: chandrila. He swallowed down the water flooding his mouth, fought back the nausea. 

“Almost every payment in is coming from the same source,” Kleya was saying. “For the most part these aren’t huge sums so my guess is it’s expenses incurred that the buyer would be covering: paying sources for information, bribes for access, that sort of thing. Finding out who was going to be in which med centre on what day. You can see there, there’s code names against some of these - the buyer would know who’s being referred to.“

“Is that common?”

She shrugged. “I’ve seen it done. Suggests whoever was paying for this is either an amateur or someone who wanted to keep a very close eye on their contractor’s activities. The account’s certainly been set up right, though - it’s absolutely seamless. We’ll get nowhere trying to trace them through the banking systems and I’ve spent three days trying.”

“But someone was paying.”

“Someone was definitely paying and presumably they’re still hoping to get what they paid for. Here, look, these are the final transactions - everything remaining in that account got pulled out again the day after the incident at the med centre.”

Erskin took one deep breath and then another, watched the shadows of the shoaling fish playing out patterns on the floor. “I’d really hoped she was right about this being nothing.”

“You were right to trust your instincts. She should have taken it more seriously.”

What she meant was that Mon should have brought this to Luthen and Kleya herself and let them decide whether she’d been targeted or not, and Erskin wasn’t even sure he’d disagree but he didn’t have the time or the inclination to discuss it right now. “She’s been under a lot of pressure lately. It’s hard.”

“We mortals can barely imagine,” Kleya said. “Regardless - at least one person close to her is selling information about where she’ll be and when, and we are all going to be under considerably more pressure until we can find out who. Do any names leap to mind immediately?”

He was already thinking through who’d have access to what. Mon’s personal appointments should be walled off from Senate business, he’d been careful about that since Tay Kolma started trying to get round him via Hendri, but that still left… No, he’d need more time. He shook his head.

“What about her husband?”

“No. No, it wouldn’t be Perrin.”

“He’d know where she was going to be, wouldn’t he?” Kleya said, her tone as sharp as a knife. “And you’ve said yourself she doesn’t trust him.”

“Yeah, but he wouldn’t do this.” That much Erskin was sure of. Perrin was careless and petty and downright vicious to Mon sometimes but actually putting her in danger, taking bribes from people who wanted to hurt her - no, surely not that. Just a few days ago Perrin had been sniping at her about some encounter with Orson Krennic at Sculdun’s party, try to avoid getting yourself arrested for treason at the in-laws next time, would you? It was one of the places where their respective parts in her life overlapped: an unspoken agreement to watch out for Mon where she couldn’t or wouldn’t watch out for herself. 

“You don’t know what people will do,” Kleya said. “He’s got into trouble with gambling debts before, he knows all sorts of unpleasant people, he’s a very obvious -”

“He’s not -”

“- a very obvious weak point and you know that even if you don’t want to think it.”

There was a sickening, sharp feeling deep in his gut; she wouldn’t be suggesting Perrin without a reason. Kleya didn’t jump to conclusions. “I don’t think he’d do it,” he said, his voice sounding hollow even to himself.

“You said he’s on a cruise, yes? Leaving Coruscant tomorrow, meeting her on Alderaan? And you’re sure about that.”

“He sent me the schedule so I’d have a copy for Mon’s plans.”

“What’s the name of the ship?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Would you know it if you saw it?”

“I don’t know, maybe? Why?“ 

She showed him. Another sheet of transactions much like the last: deposit in, credits withdrawn; deposit in, credits withdrawn; and then a larger payment to a company name he wished he didn’t recognise.

“The banking details are all correct, I’ve checked,” she said. “The initial booking was made four months ago. This part of the reference here is the voyage code - route, schedule, ship. The Jernau Morat.”

Of course. Of course. He hardly needed to confirm it was the same ship Perrin would be travelling on, though he nodded anyway. 

He didn’t want to believe this of Perrin, that was the truth. Maybe if he’d been a bit more clear-headed about everything he would have seen it earlier. Perrin was frustratingly likeable when he wanted to be and Perrin had looked out for Erskin at the wedding, and Perrin was hideous to Mon and didn’t care for her and they fought and she snarled about him and then sometimes out of nowhere some distant constellation would shift and they truly seemed to like each other again. For Erskin, balancing all of that while trying to disregard his own bitterness that it would forever be Perrin on her arm at all the parties and galas and never him, not in public, ridiculous petty jealousy for something he never could have had - and the guilt that chewed at him over what he did have - well, maybe it had all been too much to keep in his head. Maybe that’s why he’d missed this, the one thing he should have seen before anything.

There was a headache pounding behind his eyes now and he couldn’t even think clearly. Everything was a half-reached conclusion: that he’d overestimated Perrin, that Mon was in danger, that he didn’t even know what to think any more. “You should have told me this before she left,” he said. “All of this. You waited -”

“She’s safer there than here. And we couldn’t risk you saying something to her.”

“When have I -” He stopped himself. This didn’t matter now. He didn’t matter now, and whatever he felt about any of it mattered least of all. Breathe, he reminded himself. Focus. “So what do we do?”

“We get a name. More specifically, you get a name. The cruise line run banking checks for all these transactions so they’ll have some name against this and whatever that is it’ll be the identity Perrin knew. They have all their guests at their hotel in Uscru District tonight and there’s a big reception this evening so you’re going to go out there, tell them you work for Senator Mothma and you need that name. Make up a reason, it doesn’t matter. Whatever sort of thing you people would do.

“If we’re lucky, they’ll give you the information without thinking twice about it. If they don’t then you start talking about audits, threaten to call her, you make it clear you’re prepared to kick up the kind of fuss they don’t want to see with all their rich Coruscanti customers around and see if you can get them to give you the name to make you go away. And if that doesn’t work, well… Perrin’s there.”

“Tell Perrin about this?”

“I’d rather you didn’t but we need that name.” She was quiet a moment, looking ahead at the dark shapes of the shatterfish gliding past the glass. “Whatever’s going on here I don’t like it. Do whatever you need to, just get that name.”

The hotel building was a tall structure cantilevered out and above its neighbours as though unsure whether it wished to associate with the neon and crowds on the promenade below. Erskin’s airspeeder taxi brought him down to a landing pad where hospitality droids in identical and immaculate shining white hovered around the building’s entrance, one of them gliding over to greet him as the speeder departed. Its face was clear and featureless. “Will your bags be arriving later, sir?”

“I’m not one of your passengers. I need to speak with one of the senior crew officers on duty tonight.”

The droid moved its head forward a little, concerned. “There is a problem?”

“Hopefully not. The Senator I work for has some questions about the information held on one of her family members who’s travelling with you.” At least he’d had enough practice with this sort of attitude that it didn’t take a great deal of effort to slip back into. He’d done similar for Mon countless times in other circumstances, though she’d never sent him to ask any questions about Perrin. Until now he’d always been glad of that. It was easiest not to think about Perrin more than he had to. 

Another tip of the droid’s head, nothing visible in its clear face but the faint blue glow behind eye apertures. A few of the grander businesses on Coruscant had been using these recently and Erskin knew the blank faces weren’t meant to look as unsettling as he found them, but it always made him uneasy. “A Senator? You have identification?” it asked, and then once it had established that his codes were authentic: “Thank you. Please follow.”

He was led into a vast open space broken up by pyramid bars and light-fountains pulsing in gentle blues and purples. It was full of people and laughter, the bright colours of expensive clothes vibrant under the light of the floating chandeliers that circled high above. There were three hundred and fourteen passengers registered for the voyage, a little under the ship’s full capacity, and it looked like all of them or close to it were here this evening. 

  A server droid glided up with a full tray of glasses and hovered hopefully in front of Erskin. He shook his head, said “Thank you, no.”

“Please, do,” his hospitality droid escort said in its calm, melodic voice. “You are our guest no matter how brief your stay with us. We have an excellent Corellian wine selection tonight.”

Of course they did. Wouldn’t it be nice to live in Perrin’s world where the greatest priorities were what was on the wine list. “Very kind of you but I’d rather not while I’m working.” 

The droid made a soft mmm sound in acknowledgement and led him onwards, along a curving path that ran through the outer flank of the crowd. Few people even glanced in their direction; everyone seemed busy with their own conversations, and Erskin assumed he didn’t register to them as out of place here or as important enough to pay attention to. 

Perrin might, though, and so Perrin remained a risk until Erskin recognised his laughter and could finally place where he was in the crowd. He had his back to them and was deep in conversation with a group of others, and didn’t turn around.

They reached a semi-private area separated from the main space by low dividing walls, where three large chairs around a low table faced an empty desk. “We are able to provide sound-blocking fields for your conversation should it be required,” the droid said with a gesture towards the noise of conversations coming from beyond the divider, a nod to the polite fiction that sound-blocking fields would be used for convenience and comfort rather than secrecy. Not that it made much of a difference, though. Those things were unreliable and more likely to draw attention than to do anything else.

“I hope that won’t be necessary,” he said, leaving open the possibility that it might be later.

The droid dipped its blank face down in a half-bow of acknowledgement. “If you will be content to wait here for a few minutes I will bring one of the crew to assist you in your concern. Might I bring you some refreshment? We have a variety of non-alcoholic drinks available and our caterers would be pleased to provide you with a selection of your choosing.”

“Uh, water will be fine. Thank you.”

“I will bring water,” the droid said, and tipped its head again before it whirred away. Erskin noticed that it sped up slightly as it passed the low divider wall. 

It was always hard to tell with droids programmed to make guests and customers feel comfortable or pandered to, but Erskin could sense just enough concern in this one to satisfy him that he’d made the right kind of impression on it. He didn’t need the staff to be seriously worried about his presence here but he did want them worried enough to give him the information he needed.

 The droid didn’t return. Instead, after a short time a uniformed human officer appeared and introduced herself as Second Officer Daraay as she handed Erskin a glass of water with purple star-cut fruit bobbing among ice cubes. “We weren’t aware you were coming,” she said. “If there’s a miscommunication on our end I do apologise. Sometimes messages aren’t passed along very efficiently and if your people did try to reach us -”

“We didn’t,” he said. Safest to be we, here; safest to imply there are others who might be involved and who might yet appear. “It’s often easiest to sort these things out in person.”

Daraay was visibly relieved. “Yes, indeed.”

Erskin drank a little of the chilled water before continuing. He didn’t want this to take any longer than it had to but it was unwise to look hurried. “I’m here on behalf of Senator Mothma of Chandrila. Her husband Perrin Fertha is travelling on the Jernau Morat tomorrow and it’s been… brought to our attention that his record on the passenger manifest may have inadvertently exposed some of the family’s private information.” 

It really didn’t matter whether Daraay took his word for it that it was purely a security issue or she suspected it was some Perrin-related scandal Mon was trying to manage, though Erskin couldn’t help but dislike suggesting the second; he didn’t care in the slightest about Perrin’s reputation but Mon didn’t deserve any of this. 

Daraay’s expression sharpened, startled. “I really don’t see how that could be. We’re very careful with all of our passenger data, I assure you. Have you… Did you speak with Mr Fertha about this already?”

“No. I’m hoping there’ll be no need to disturb Perrin’s evening.” This seemed to come as a relief to her; perhaps it was time to adjust the approach a little. With a smile calculated to fall halfway between sharing a confidence and asking a favour, Erskin said “Politics, you know? There’s been some press interest in her family’s private concerns, and, ah… We’re keen they remain private. She’d rather have this managed with discretion.” Sorry, Mon. 

“I understand,” Daraay said. “Confidentiality is very important to us.”

That was a euphemistic way of putting it from what Erskin had heard about these cruises: no suggestion of anything illegal happening, no, but there were good reasons they were popular with the careless rich like Perrin who wanted to enjoy themselves closer to home than Canto Bight. “That’s appreciated,” he said.

A nod again: they understand each other. 

“As I understand it, it’s probably just the passenger manifest I need to know about,” Erskin says. “I believe your other records aren’t shared outside the company?”

“No, of course not. We have our own legal and accountancy staff. The manifest - yes - obviously that gets shared but only where strictly necessary, it’s not publicly available.”

“And by necessary you mean planetary authorities? Imperial authorities?”

“Yes, sometimes. Planetary authorities when it’s a condition of entering their airspace but the manifest is always encrypted and their code certs will limit access to the basic fields and anything else we know they require - that’s usually criminal convictions or membership of prohibited organisations or any weapons carried. We don’t give out the full file. Imperial authorities would be able to request it the same way but we make sure we’re compliant with all the up to date travel regulations before we depart and they’re content with that.”

Erskin was familiar with the latest travel regulations, of course: as a list drawn up for Mon so she could decide which to concede and which to fight over, as the extra twenty-four minutes he’d spent waiting in a featureless room at the western spaceport last month when Ghorman on his own ID had triggered automatic additional screening. He had taken great care not to look annoyed about it in the slightest.

“Of course,” he said now, smiling, polite. “And when you say the basic fields - what does that include?”

“Identification, Core Worlds visa codes, booking information - uh, by that I mean it’s obviously straightforward if the passenger’s made their own booking but when it’s a gift or bought on their behalf that all gets linked in the manifest to show everything’s been correctly authenticated. We’re fully compliant with all the money laundering regulations”

“And Perrin’s was a gift ticket - is that correct?”

“Ah - yes, I believe it was. Yes.”

Slim as the chances were he’d still been hoping she’d say no to that one, but he couldn’t afford to dwell on his own disappointment and anger now. “Would the manifest hold any other information?”

“There’s space to include any particular passenger specifics that need to be noted for planetary restrictions but that’s usually blank for most of our passengers. We encode most information about on-board specifics. You know, dietary requirements or atmospheric requirements, travel companions, anything like that - we hold that too but we wouldn’t include it on the basic fields.”

He nodded, taking a moment for the silence to linger as though he’s processing any more questions he might have. “All right. I see. In that case, can you show me what’s held on the manifest for Perrin’s journey? I don’t think we need to see any of the restricted information - it sounds like that wouldn’t be easily accessible to anyone who, ah, might have the wrong reasons for asking.”

“Oh, absolutely it wouldn’t,” she said. “The basic - Yes, I think we can. I don’t have authorisation myself, I’ll need to get Commodore Cyta, but he’s around somewhere, it won’t take long. Uh…” She glanced back over her shoulder, where some of the crowds were just about visible over the divider wall. “If you wouldn’t mind waiting a little longer, I’m sorry to keep you…”

“It’s no trouble at all,” he said, although he’s already itching to get the information and be gone as soon as possible. At least Daraay seemed like she’d  be just as keen as he was to have this over with; Kleya was right that they don’t want any Senator’s staff here asking questions, and especially not when those questions were about their ability to keep their passengers’ business private. 

And so he wasn’t worried when Daraay didn’t return immediately, nor when more time passed and then more and he was still there alone. He wasn’t even worried when the hospitality droid that had led him in came over to apologise for the delay. Slight unease started to crawl at the back of his mind when the droid asked to scan his diplomatic identity codes again, but even then it didn’t rise to the level of worry, not really: the codes would show he worked for Mon, this was the sort of thing she’d ask one of her trusted staff to do rather than get involved with herself.

The droid seemed satisfied enough and departed without any further requests, leaving Erskin there alone with - what was wrong? Something was wrong.

His glass, that was it. His empty glass there on the table that the hospitality droid hadn’t offered to refill. Apparently he was no longer their very welcome guest.

He considered leaving then and there while he still had the opportunity. Kleya was always saying trust your instincts, don’t take stupid risks, remember if they get you they get her and his instincts were sounding an increasingly loud alarm now. But if he left that would surely be as good as confirming any suspicions they might have about him here and besides - they had his name, they’d scanned his codes. And above it all, if he left he’d lose any opportunity to get that name. 

When Daraay returned there was another officer accompanying her, a man with more senior rank insignia who didn’t bother to introduce himself. “We apologise that this is taking longer than we’d hoped,” Daraay said, all calm lacquered smiles. “Commodore Cyta will be with us as soon as possible.”

This was really not the sort of issue that should require three of them to deal with. He affected his best polite-yet-increasingly-irritated tone and said “Good to hear that. It’s getting rather late.”

“Won’t be too much longer,” the other officer said. His smile didn’t waver and didn’t warm his face at all. “Senator Mothma -” 

But at that point a comlink chirped at his side and he stopped, whispered something quick to Daraay and then left swiftly to answer it.

This definitely wasn’t good. 

Erskin rolled his head back on the seat behind him and stifled a yawn, creating as best he could the impression he’s in no hurry to leave. “What’s delaying Commodore Cyta?”

Daraay took a little too long to answer. “He’s dealing with some other issues at the moment.” 

You’re lying, was what Erskin thought, but “Sounds like a busy night out there” is all he said, nodding in the direction of the laughter and loud voices coming from the reception. 

“Yes.” She was polite enough but there was a new brittleness to it now, and she certainly wasn’t volunteering any information.

“Can I ask a favour?”

“I, ah… Favour?”

“Any chance of another glass of water? The air in here’s really drying out my throat.”

“Of course,” she said, sounding a little too relieved that was all he wanted. “I’ll get that for you right now.” And then she was gone too, and he was alone again.

He had… a minute or two, at most. A minute or two and no good options. What were they doing? Had they spoken to Perrin? No, surely not; he could see Perrin from here if he leaned back far enough, still with the same crowd he was talking to earlier. 

Nothing else for it, then.

No-one was paying attention as Erskin walked out into the crowd of reception guests. It was a risk to say the least and it wasn’t as if he had a clear plan for how to play this well, but he surely wasn’t going to get that name out of the crew here. Perrin… well, Perrin wouldn’t be keen to help, exactly, that seemed beyond optimistic, but Perrin could damn well listen. 

Perrin was fully enveloped in some loud brawl of a conversation once Erskin reached him, three of them trying to tell the same story over their own laughter and someone clapping Perrin’s shoulder so hard a drink almost spills. It was briefly very satisfying to see the utter confusion on his face as he spinned around at the sound of his name. Perrin was usually so observant in this kind of situation, always seemed to have half an eye on who else was talking to who and what else was happening around him, but here for a moment he was entirely caught off guard. 

“Erskin?” he said. “What in stars’ name are you doing here?” Then, in a much more familiar resigned annoyance: “What does she want?”

“We need to speak in private,” Erskin said in a tone he wouldn’t usually use for Perrin, one he reserved for saying things like the Senator has made her position clear. They didn’t have time to debate this.

“I’m in the middle of a conversation.”

“Perrin. Now.”

Perrin’s eyebrows lifted in a silent incredulity. He didn’t move.

“Are you in trouble?” one of Perrin’s companions said, and another one laughed, loud. And that it seemed was enough to break the spell or the standoff or whatever this was. 

Perrin grinned and downs the last of the drink he’s holding. “Sounds like it. If you’ll all excuse me a few minutes…”

“No rest, eh?” said the man beside him. 

“You’d know, Janto.” And whatever that referred to was apparently hilarious enough to leave them all in laughter as Perrin steered Erskin away. 

They headed for a quieter area of the hall, which was good, but - yes, that was someone in uniform up ahead. “Not that way,” he said quietly. 

Perrin was longer smiling. “Avoiding someone?”

“Bit of a disagreement with the crew earlier on.”

Perrin noded, slowly. He didn’t look troubled to hear it but then he rarely looked troubled by anything; the kind of world Perrin lived in was not full of traps and threats and barriers, or at least not for people like him. He kept walking and Erskin had no choice but to keep up.

The officer, the tall one who’d been there with Daraay earlier, manoeuvred fast around the other guests to block Erskin’s path. “This is a restricted area,” he said, keeping his voice below any level that would draw attention. “You can’t be here with the guests.”

“Wait, wait, now,” Perrin’s tone was more curious than confrontational but he was nevertheless there, making himself very hard to ignore. “Why can’t he?”

The officer hadn’t expected that. “I apologise if he’s bothering you, Mr Fertha. Commodore Cyta has requested that he be removed from the premises immediately.”

“What’s he done?”

“It’s… nothing to worry about. I’m sure the Commodore will be happy to reassure you personally when -”

“Well if it’s nothing to worry about it can wait ten minutes, I’m talking to him,” Perrin said, clapping an arm around Erskin’s shoulders and steering them both off again in a purposeful sort of manner that did not expect to be interrupted and, to Erskin’s surprise, wasn’t. The officer stepped aside and they were simply allowed to pass through.

The crowd thinned, and then thinned further, and by the time they reached the windowed wall there was no-one left near them. The lights were a little dimmer here and the decorations more sparse; the view here out towards the edges of the district was apparently of less interest. 

Perrin released his hold on Erskin’s shoulders and leaned back against the railing. “What did you do out there?”

“Asked questions. Listen, this is about Mon -”

“Of course it’s Mon. Aren’t you supposed to be off duty? There’s a big glittering universe out there and you’re young, Erskin. You must have some hobbies that aren’t her.” He took a long drink from his glass. “No need to cut into mine.”

“Your hobbies are not important right now. She’s in danger.” 

And that was enough in itself that Perrin shut up for a moment and listened, and Erskin told him more. He didn’t  mention Kleya or the bank account or the ticket for this cruise, but the detail of what had almost happened and the effects of the drug that the intruder nearly got to Mon with, all that he spells out in unflinching detail.

Perrin dragged his palm down over his mouth and swallows. He didn’t say anything, and when he balanced his empty glass down on the railing his hand was shaking a little. 

“I need to know who bought your ticket for this cruise,” Erskin said. “I need a name.”

At first Perrin gave no indication that he’s even heard, and then something in him quietly clicked into focus. “And why would that be?”

“I don’t care what they told you, all right? It doesn’t matter. Just give me a name and I can -“

“Are you suggesting I’m involved with this? I’d appreciate you at least having the courage to say so, Erskin. Come on, if you’re going to accuse me of trying to murder my wife you can’t get squeamish about saying the words.”

Oh, he didn’t  have time for this. “Whoever was paying for information about her bought a ticket for this voyage. This ship, this same one.”

“And you think that’s what Mon’s life is worth to me,” Perrin said. “A few days on a cruise ship.”

“I’m not saying you knew. Maybe they told you they were selling it to a news outlet or one of her challengers back home -”

“Oh, because then it’s the sort of thing I’d do.”

This isn’t about you, he wanted to scream at the man. You don’t matter. “I just need a name, Perrin.”

But Perrin was already shaking his head. “I’ve always liked you but you really are turning into an annoying little brat these days.”

“She could have died! Don’t you care?”

 “Oh I doubt it, not like you care. I couldn’t compete with all that earnest devotion at my age. Here’s your name, then.” And he took a folded wallet from an inner pocket of his robe and handed it to Erskin without any further objection, and waited. 

Inside the red leather case was one of those glossy travel docs they emboss with the company’s seal stamped and outlined in shimmer thread. Perrin’s identification, all his travel authorisations, the time and date and travel schedule of the cruise itself, and then a line for Paid in full (gift) and - a name.

He swallowed. 

“Five-day pilgrimage present last year,” Perrin said, sounding for all the world as though he was making friendly conversation. “Can’t think why you didn’t just ask her. You could have saved yourself the trip out here.”

Erskin read it three times over, lost for what to say and what to even think. There it was, the same every time: Paid in full (gift): Senator Mon Mothma. 

“No, no,” Perrin was saying now, “save the apologies for later. Are you absolutely, absolutely sure that whoever’s after her bought a ticket for this ship? Yes? So just to be sure I have this correct - you’re telling me that someone on this voyage is a threat to Mon and out of three hundred and fifty people you have now ruled out one of us. Well done.”

From here the crowd was a shoal of shining colours and laughter too loud and too bright. “Three hundred and seventeen,” Erskin said quietly. “It wasn’t at full capacity.”

“Oh, good, that’ll narrow it down for you.”

The man was beyond exasperating. “You’re probably the target. They must have known you’d be on this ship. The crew’s already suspicious of me, someone must have said something to them -”

“Shut up, will you, I’m thinking,” Perrin says, and then was quiet for a while, staring out at the city’s glow against the darkness beyond and not even looking at Erskin any more. 

Time dragged past. Erskin thought of walking out, now, even at the cost of leaving Perrin unattended and unpredictable, just to be out of this place and back in air he could breathe again; this vast room was smothering now and the sounds of music and laughter and ice clinking in drinks had blended into a shrill cacophony. And he thought of how warm Mon had felt in his arms earlier, how he’d been stroking her back so gently those last few minutes in her bed before the alarm ordered them back into their day, and how that was only this morning but now it felt like a memory he couldn’t even trust was real. 

“Right!” Perrin said, straightening up. “I have an idea.”

It took longer than Erskin would have liked to work their way back through the crowds to the crew offices. Perrin was deliberately slow, stopping several times to greet people he recognised and detouring to one of the pyramid bars where he passed Erskin a glass of something a deep shade of orange with frosted glitter-sugar on the rim. “Best fit in, hmm?” he murmured, lips already close to Erskin’s ear. 

“What is it?”

“No idea. Pretend you like it - won’t look very convincing if I don’t know what you drink.”

It was nectar wine, a little sweet for Erskin’s usual taste though not too bad. In other circumstances he’d probably have enjoyed it enough. 

Perrin steered them on again, arm draped back around Erskin’s shoulders in a way that would have looked casual enough to anyone watching though it felt more like steel, kept on with that low whisper that would have looked - that was meant to look - intimate to anyone watching them. “Zal Cyta’s an old friend from back in my regiment days. He doesn’t look for trouble, he wants a nice easy life so he’s not going to be hard to talk round.”

“I wish I had your confidence,” Erskin muttered into the edge of his glass. The thought of getting to Cyta’s office only to find an ISB delegation there to welcome him wouldn’t leave his mind. 

“I’m confident because I know how this works. Eternal truth of the universe: the best way to get people off the scent of a rumour is to give them a better rumour instead.”

“As long as you’re entertained, Perrin.” He hadn’t intended the snap in his voice there, not really, but there it was all the same and he didn’t feel remotely inclined to apologise. 

Perrin snorted. “Delightful company you’re shaping up to be. What’s bothering you now, you don’t want these people thinking you’re taken?”

“I don’t care about these people.” He didn’t want to be here in this place with any of them, Perrin included. Right now he didn’t even want to be on Coruscant. “I need to find out who tried to hurt her. That’s all I care about.”

And he braced himself for whatever jibe Perrin would aim at him for that one, but none came.

Commodore Cyta was a hearty, jovial man with sharp eyes, the kind of person who had never had to worry about much and was keen to ensure his life stayed that way. He’d seemed quite relieved when his assistant showed Erskin and Perrin into his office and Erskin got the clear impression that Cyta wouldn’t at all care how this problem was resolved so long as it went away.

“I really can only apologise, Perrin,” he was saying now that both assistant and other officers had left, allowing them at Perrin’s request to discuss the matter in private.. “We were under the impression - well, not that it matters now. Our mistake. Many apologies to both of you.”

“Ah, I’m as much to blame myself,” Perrin says. “Bad communication. Not to bore you with all the detail of it, but…” A little half-twist of a smile at Erskin. “We should have talked before this. Saved you the trouble of going through all this rigmarole to find out where I was going.”

“Hindsight’s always so clear,” Erskin said. There was an opportunity there to offer his own apology, concede he hadn’t exactly told the truth about his motives for asking the details of Perrin’s journey while letting Cyta believe Perrin’s lie about what those motives were, but he wasn’t going to get in Perrin’s way. 

“Well, you weren’t to know, were you.” Perrin’s hand on his back was, he presumed, meant to look reassuring even if it didn’t quite feel it. “Listen, Zal, I feel terrible about this whole thing and I’d really like to make it up to him. It’s, ah, it’s always quite tricky to get time together. Not many places where you can expect a little discretion these days, you know?”

“Oh, absolutely,” Cyta said. “Mr Semaj, you’re welcome to stay for the rest of the evening if you’d like. I can guarantee my crew won’t trouble you.”

Perrin’s all ease and confidence still. “I was hoping a bit more than that. You’ve got a bit of space on board, right, you’re not at full capacity? One more passenger? Not at your expense, obviously, I’d be paying.”

“Oh,” Cyta said. “I see. Well… we do have the space, but adding someone this late… It’s unconventional.”

“Your staff already checked my code certs,” Erskin said. “Twice.”

Perrin’s arm settled around Erskin’s waist, pulling him in snug. “Won’t be a problem, will it?” he said in mild surprise as his hand drifted down to Erskin’s hip and lingered there. “Come on, Zal. Please.”

Cyta wavered for a moment longer, then raised his hands palms up and laughed. “All right. All right, we’ll do it. We can do it.”

“Thank you,” Erskin said, careful to seem relieved, maybe even happily surprised. The solid warmth of Perrin’s body against his really did feel reassuring somehow, another surreal note to an entirely surreal day.

“Wonderful to hear,” Perrin says. “Thanks, Zal, truly. Always good to have some company on a long voyage. I don’t expect the sabacc table to be quite so kind to me.” And he chuckled in that soft, conspiratorial way he had, the one that always made it sound like you were being drawn into a secret purely because he liked you. 

It was six hours since Mon had left for Alderaan, and it felt like a hundred years.