lie to my face

Most Sith didn’t give Cipher Nine a second glance—most didn’t even realize who he was. He was good, that way. At keeping under the radar, being unnoticed even by the Sith he was meant to work under, from time-to-time. Even Darth Arkous, all those months ago, had struggled to track him down; even Lana, and Marr, had had a hard time keeping track of him as everything started to happen with the Revanites.

He sneaked right past the noses of those meant to watch. Spoke with a silver tongue that made others none the wiser. Was oft waved off as an insignificant sniper, when not making it obvious that he was actually Intelligence.

…Usually.

Xaerez found the yes of a young apprentice—Veira was their name—on him, that day. As he stood, going over patrol routes sent to his personal datapad; the apprentice watched from afar as their master lingered near the conference table away from the camp’s center, receiving a debrief from Darth Marr and Satele Shan alongside a few other Sith and Jedi. It was something about spirits, his hearing implants picked up. Doors, switches—whatever it was, from what he caught, they’d need the Force to activate it to get into one of the temples. Hence why Xaerez, the Champion, and Havoc Squad weren’t part of the conversation.

It was during that debrief that he caught the apprentice eyeing him.

It wasn’t the first time the same one had glared at him. But it…well, it wasn’t an angry glare. It was a thoughtful one, like the kid recognized him from somewhere but couldn’t place where from.

And it was when that meeting ended, and the Barsen’thor and Wrath ended up the ones chosen to get into the temple while another group watched their backs, that the apprentice approached him—as he’d expected they might.

Lord Xandosc’s apprentice, he knew. A part of Lord Azan’s power base that she would often call on when her status as Wrath (and tendency to brute force a situation) wasn’t quite enough to get a job done. He also knew the kid was a spitfire, prone to lashing out—and was Chiss. From what Xaerez had read in their files while getting an understanding of Azan and her allies, the kid had been sent away from Csilla as an infant when their Force-sensitivity was discovered, and ended up raised by a rather prestigious Sith couple.

They’d certainly found a place for themself.

“Uh, hello?” the apprentice asked. Their voice was slightly muffled behind a cloth mask that covered the lower half of their face.

Xaerez stood at a straighter parade rest. “My lord.”

They didn’t say anything, for a while. Instead, giving the agent a once-over; Xaerez did the same. He had to wonder why the kid’s hair was gray, only a few locks of what must have been their original black remaining; they were just a teenager. Curious.

“Lord Wrath calls you Cipher Nine. Is that really your name?” They sounded credulous; he didn’t blame them.

“Yes.” What more could he say? Veira was one of Azan’s trusted allies; there was little he could do to hide that part of his identity from the kid if she’d already told them.

“Don’t you have a name name?”

To his quirked brow, the apprentice snorted and waved him off. “Right, right. Top secret spy stuff, got it.”

Maybe once upon a time, that would have pulled a laugh from the agent. Maybe in his younger days, when he was but Veira’s own age, hanging with delinquents on Csilla and slicing into systems he shouldn’t have.

Veira was quiet for another few moments, and Xaerez took that as a chance to glance back down at his datapad.

That is, until the apprentice opened their mouth again.

“I’ve seen you in a dream before.”

His hand hovered over the screen as his eyes flicked back up at them. Had he heard that right?

“...Pardon?”

And then they were laughing as they brushed a manicured hand through their grayed hair.

It was with that laugh that Xaerez’s breath caught in his throat. They sounded exactly like—

“Why did you…” They hummed, as if they were…trying to find their words. “You’re the one who killed my uh… My birth parents.” They didn’t look angry, merely curious; it didn’t put Xaerez any more at ease. “…Why?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know who you’re talking about,” he answered oh, so carefully. “I’ve had a very long career.” Surely it was just a coincidence. A coincidence, that they had Xaanehz’s laugh. A coincidence, that he finally noticed the look in their eyes—and that they looked just like Ullem’s did, just with the addition of artful wings and shadow.

“You’re a liar.” The apprentice had stepped close, their curiosity falling away to irritation. If it wasn’t for the mask they wore, Xaerez was certain he would have felt their breath on his face. “I can sense it. You know exactly who I’m talking about. Don’t you, Agent?”

It took everything he had not to step back. “...What did you see, in your dream?” he asked instead. He had to know, if his suspicion was right.

And as they described it, Xaerez had to swallow the anxiety rising in his throat. A type of anxiety, that he hadn’t felt in a very, very long time—he couldn’t let them sense it.

An assassin, they said. Their parents, and who they assumed were their grandparents, sniped from afar before they even knew what hit them. A beautiful manor on Alderaan. The sound of waterfalls, and Thranta, the anxious breathing of their killer as boots crunched over snow.

“I saw your face,” they ended with. “So...why?”

Lies came so easily to him, even as nausea bubbled in the pit of his stomach. “It was an order,” he said. His voice was too even for the way he felt. “I don’t remember the details—” an eidetic memory made that a blatant lie, but the kid didn’t know that, “—only that they forged various sensitive files to hide your existence. In doing so, they put an entire system at risk.” How much of that was actually the lie he fabricated, he wondered, and how much was far closer to the truth than he’d ever realized?

“They…” Their gaze cut to the side, as if they were warring with themself over how to go about the information. “They died protecting me from stupid Ascendancy laws?” Everyone knew how most Chiss viewed the Force. That made Xaerez’s job easier, if the kid figured that part out for themself. It was less time for him to have to linger on the realization that his sister’s baby—that little Unarhem—was very much alive and standing mere inches in front of him, that she’d lied so convincingly about him dying from the sickness he’d been born with. It was less time for him to have to linger on the memory of seeing her face for the last time through the scope of a rifle.

“I’m afraid so.”

Then their hand was on his jacket, shoving him into the stones behind him with enough force that he couldn’t hide his grimace, nor the way his datapad slipped from his hands to fall into the grass at their feet.

“And you just…agreed to do it?”

If he hadn’t, someone else would have. He couldn’t let another handle it, couldn’t run the risk of Xaanehz, or her husband, or their parents, suffering at the hands of another. The way he’d done it was quick, painless. He couldn’t have stomached it had it been handled any differently.

But instead, he only nodded—and was grateful for the mask that he wore. For the way it shrouded his eyes behind tinted transparisteel; shrouded, the way he bit his lip behind the sturdy metal. “I was doing my job.”

Their fist tightened against his lapel, the leather against manicured nails making an unpleasant noise for his hearing implants. If it weren’t for the fact that they both wore masks, their noses would have practically been touching.

“You’re hiding something.”

“With all due respect, my lord. You didn’t know them—”

“No, but maybe I could have figured some more shit out.” They shoved him again; Xaerez hissed between his teeth when the back of his head cracked against the stone. “I’ve had this dream over and over—why?! What are you lying to me about?!”

Resisting the urge to reach a hand up to feel for any blood on the back of his head, he instead brought his hands up non-threateningly. He knew—maybe even better than the apprentice did—that if Veira decided to attack him, he wouldn’t stand a chance in defending himself. Melee combat wasn’t exactly something he was good at, especially not with his damned foot being as bad as it was.

He racked his brain for something to smooth Veira anger, something he could offer that wouldn’t put his own hide at risk.

“I know what your name was. Before your parents took you in.”

The pause they gave was all the answer he needed; that should suffice nicely.

“Nearu’narhe’maal—Unarhem. From the Nearu and Rediaex families.” No one knew his full name, he knew. Offering his family’s name didn’t matter, not anymore, not now that anyone who might have known them knew they were all dead.

He could hear Veira take a breath—

Then they grumbled under their breath when their master called to them from across the camp.

One last shove—Xaerez barely held his head forward enough that it wouldn’t hit the stone again—and the apprentice stormed off with one last, “We’re not done,” thrown over their shoulder.

He took a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, tipping his head back against the cool rock behind him as he squeezed his eyes shut, just for a moment.

So…Unarhem was alive.

Unarhem, who he’d attended a funeral for. Who he’d known was so incredibly ill after being born. Who he’d known (or, thought he’d known) couldn’t have survived with how weak h—they, were.

And he thought he was good at keeping his identity buried.

What a damned discovery…