To Do the Next Right Thing

Part 9

To Do the Next Right Thing

Chapter 9

Had it not been for the pressing matter of escaping the Senate Building, Armitage probably would have been in a funk, obsessing over the discovery of his mother's name and location. Rey repeated it over and over in her head: Ariadne Sinestra. She wondered if she ever went by "Ari." From the small glances Rey got of her, it seemed to suit her a bit more.

"How the hell are we supposed to get out of here?" he whispered, once they found what they were looking for. "There's probably a party out on the run trying to find us."

"I've thought about that." Rey sighed.

"Hey—" BB-8 beeped, still plugged into the computer. "This computer picked up some recent files when I did a search for his mother's name!"

"What?" Rey said, scrambling to fetch her datapad again.

"The computer must still be useful post-Empire, especially to the New Republic," Armitage pointed out. "How recent, though?"

"Probably recent enough to confirm his mother is still alive and still in the same place."

"Right here," said Armitage. "I asked you the question."

BB-8 ignored him, only focusing on getting whatever information he could on his mother to Rey. "This might be the wrong file, but it seems to line up with the dates."

Rey scrolled through her datapad, and the new information BB-8 had downloaded. "No record of your mother's name, but there's an Ari Fortris on Quarrow, married to a Calan Fortris a few years after your mother was sent to Nakadia. It's a decent enough lead." And a confirmation about what she figured Armitage's mother called herself. Was that another feeling through the Force?

"Is that all the information found?" he asked, and Rey could feel the eagerness in his voice, much as he tried to suppress it.

"Something about Calan Fortris owning an eating establishment near their port—she might be working there. She..." Her voice trailed off; did he want to hear this?

"What?" he pressed, and Rey shushed him.

"Remember? Patrol probably out there looking for us after we knocked out their guards?" Sighing, she looked back down at her datapad—this was going to come as a shock.

"She has three daughters. They could be your sisters."

He said nothing. He just averted his gaze to the door and let the silence sink in for a moment.

"We should get going," he finally piped up. "I think I mentioned something about a nice dinner, given we found what we're looking for."

He was still... willing to go out after this? Rey supposed he was used to being under worse hardships, but this was a new revelation. He just found out his mother was probably alive and had married—presumably with adult children maybe around the same age as Rey. "Oh." Really, she wasn't sure how to respond to that. Then again, he'd helped get her dressed up to fit in. Maybe they should go somewhere nice, if just to have one more night of normalcy before everything changed.

"Okay," she agreed. "But how do you suppose we get out of this one?" Looking to the Force, she could see that Master Yoda had used vents—but they were all too big for that. She might have to use the same tactic again and hopefully hail down a taxi or even—dare she think it—run to safety.

"Those giant pillars at the entrance were a decent cover," he figured. "Though I doubt security has gone down."

"Wait..." Rey finally figured it out. "There are landing bays on some of the upper levels. Maybe if BB-8 requests an air taxi from the computer—"