Chapter Text
Senator Leia Organa-Solo arched one perfectly shaped brow as she surveyed the gift with barely concealed amusement.
They were staying in a ritzy hotel in the capital of Chandrila for a political summit; ‘they’ being herself, her husband, their two children, and her way-too-famous twin brother.
The New Republic was paying for a handful of its most esteemed Senators to stay at the hotel next to the House of Parliament, and had begged her to rope the reluctant Jedi Master into coming too.
Reluctant was an understatement. Luke detested any and all political events outside of his new home on Mandalore, especially if he wasn't allowed to bring his husband with him.
Said husband being Mand'alor Din Djarin - literal king of the Mandalorians. The reformed kingdom had a peace treaty with the New Republic, but were not part of it. Therefore Din was not able to attend.
The only way she could convince him to come was if the three of them shared a suite and they could use the time between events for some family bonding.
She made her case to the Senate, who agreed to adjust their reservations so that Luke could stay in their suite instead of having one of his own.
The very thought of a pining Luke Skywalker being left all alone in such a big, empty hotel suite was enough to set her teeth on edge.
It had worked out rather nicely, as it happened. The penthouse suite they were given was beautiful and spacious, with a big central living area and three bedrooms branching off from it.
Leia and Han took the master bedroom, with Luke taking the other that had a double bed, and the twins taking the kids room with the two single beds.
Their children, Jacen and Jaina, were four years old and just adored their Uncle Luke, so they were having a marvellous time on this 'family holiday.'
It was nice to go about their day without needing to keep an eye out for the Courscanti paparazzi descending upon them.
Leia was also famous and well loved by their people for her work both as a Commander in the Rebel Alliance, and a Senator of the New Republic - however her fame was totally eclipsed by Luke's, since he was the 'Last Jedi' who had destroyed the first Death Star and (as far as everyone was concerned) killed the Emporer and his Sith Lord Enforcer.
In fact, whenever she was interviewed on holovised platforms or shows, Leia always received at least a handful of questions about her elusive brother who very much shied away from public appearances.
This only got worse after Luke allowed his marriage with the Mand'alor to 'come out' - setting off a societal storm that rocked the holonet and pretty much all branches of media.
They showed up to a Life Day commemoration for all Rebel personnel who fought against the Empire - hand in hand, with matching pauldrons on their right shoulders, engraved with the mudhorn emblem of Din's Clan.
While hearts broke across the core and mid rim planets for loss of the galaxys' most elible bachelor, the Senate was in uproar that Luke would marry such a powerful individual who was outside the New Republics' control.
Indeed, it had been quite a mess and a lot of work for her to clean up, but it was hard to stay mad at him for it seeing him so happy. The Mand'alor, in turn, was just as besotted with him and doted on him terribly.
It was almost funny to think that there were rumors flying around at first that it was a marriage of convenience; Luke getting to build his Jedi Academy on Mandalore without being beholden to the New Republic for funding, while Din got a one up on the Senate by marrying their greatest asset.
Luke was horrified when he found out about that, so when Leia was next asked about it in an interview, she set them straight.
More than just assuring everyone that it was a marriage of love, she told them her favourite story about them as a couple.
Having grown up a moisture farmer on Tatooine and never tasting any kind of fruit (besides the lamta) until he left the planet at nineteen years old, Luke was crazy about fruit.
His favourite thing to do when visiting a new planet was taste as many of their native varieties of fruit as possible.
It was a passion rivaling his love for water and any even semi-aquatic environment. The first thing he did in his time off back when the Rebellion was stationed on Yavin IV was get Han to teach him how to swim at the crystalline lake nearest their base.
After that, if ever he couldn't be found around the base, all one had to do was head over to the lake and there he was; submerged up to his neck in just his smallclothes. Apparently, his love of water trumped his sense of modesty.
When Din realised this, he had a pool built for him at their palace and made it his mission to seek out all the most obscure and exotic fruits to present to his husband.
Each time he brought him a new fruit, Luke would press their foreheads together in a Keldabe kiss and recite their Mandalorian wedding vows.
Every. Single. Time.
Which brought Leia back to the gift that had arrived with Luke's name on it, courtesy of a very flustered concierge.
The hotel staff must have seen this interview when it aired a few months ago, because they had sent him an enormous fruit basket.
Luke was going to be ecstatic. It was just the thing to lift his spirits. As much as he was happy to spend time with them, he missed Din something terrible, and they had only been here a day! They still had the rest of the week to go.
'I'm going to have to send Luke down to thank them for the fruit basket,' she mused to herself. 'Wish there was a way to show them how happy he will be with their gift without making him do that. I know he will feel awkward about it.'
That's when an idea struck.
Smirking to herself, she went and grabbed her small, portable holocam from her travel bag and set it up on the shelf of the little kitchenette, then hid the fruit basket behind the dining table so Luke wouldn't see it when he walked in.
Once that was done, she leaned against said table, making sure she wasn't standing in line with the holocam, and called her brother.
"Luke?" She let her voice carry throughout the suite. "Can you come here for a minute?"
A scuffle from the direction of the kids room, then "coming!"
A moment later, he emerged - cloakless and barefoot in just his black pants and the underlayer of his Jedi robes - a twin holding each of his hands.
"We were playing 'hide and seek.'" He said in a mock grumpy voice. "You just made me lose."
The twins giggled.
Leia smiled at how soft he was. No wonder her kids were so taken with their 'Unk Lu' as they called him.
"Well, if it makes you feel any better, the hotel staff have sent you a gift."
She watched as his initial wariness gave way to a child-like curiosity.
After a short pause for dramatic effect, she reached down and hefted the fruit basket up on to the table.
Luke's jaw dropped but then his eyes lit up and he huffed a disbelieving laugh. "Are you serious?! This is for me??"
He let go of the twins to pad closer and brush his fingers against the transparent cellophane wrapped around the basket, before reaching up to untie the big green bow.
"What are we having first, kids? Jogan fruit?"
"Yeah!" They cried, and he busied himself with finding a plate, knife and cutting board, all while sporting the biggest grin.
It melted her heart to watch him cutting it up and sharing it out among them (he offered it to her as well but she declined), all three shunning any form of cutlery to pick up the cubed pieces of fruit with their fingers, getting juice on their hands and all down their chins.
It was then that Leia decided to come clean about the holocam, grabbing it to bring closer with the device trained on them.
"Ok guys, time to say thank you to the hotel staff for all your goodies, because you know that Uncle Luke is going to share all of this with you."
Luke glanced up and flushed pink when he saw the holocam, quickly grabbing at some tissues to wipe his face. "Stars, Leia! Were you filming that whole time?"
"It's just for the hotel staff," she assured him quickly. Through their mind link, she elaborated {'I know you would feel uncomfortable going to thank them in person since they are going to be all twittery and star-struck with you, so we can thank them like this instead.'}
His blush deepened, but he gave a subtle nod of acknowledgment. "Well, alright then."
He cleared his throat before beaming his magnetic farm boy grin at the holocam.
"Thank you so much to everyone who was involved in this. It's a very generous gift, and I'll assure you we will savour it - isn't that right, kids?"
Jacen and Jaina were still gobbling down their share of the fruit but also smiled and waved, chiming their own unpolished, boisterous thanks as juice continued to drip down their little chins.
Chuckling, Luke took another couple of tissues to dab at them, as they continued to eat, unperturbed by mama and the holocam. "I think the fruit basket was a winner for these guys too."
After he directed one last dazzling smile at the device in her hands, she stopped recording and nodded approvingly. "Thank you all. I'll send that to them now."
Leaving Luke to clean up the kitchen and her juice-covered children (he was the one who got them messy, after all), she went to the little study where she had all her data pads and work comms to download the recording.
After sending it through to the digital contact address provided to communicate with the hotel, she opened up a datapad and decided to finish typing up some notes from the last conference they had that day.
A reply message was sent back within minutes, which surprised her even though it probably shouldn't.
The hotel manager was clearly thrilled, as were the rest of her team, whom she spoke for as well.
One could definitely pick up on the notes of fangirl enthusiasm between the carefully professional words, and it made Leia snigger a little.
Poor Luke will never get used to being a hero-worshipped 'heart throb,' as the holonet often called him.
Deciding to leave out the details, Leia poked her head through the study door and called out, "the hotel staff are very happy with your 'thank you' message!"
"That's nice," Luke called back absently as he mopped up the stickiness on the table with a wet cloth. Her twins were playing nearby, now clean and evidently impatient to get their uncles full attention again.
Not long afterwards, she received another message from the manager, politely asking for permission to publish the video on their social media page.
'Why not?' She thought. 'How many people are going to look at the social media page for a hotel on Chandrila? It's not like my kids haven't been shown on the holonet before, thanks to the Paparazzi. And Luke can't be that embarrassed about being seen eating some fruit that was given to him.'
Hitting reply, she sent an equally polite message back, giving permission for it to be used just on their social media page but only after the summit had ended, and was not to be distributed via any other means.
That done, Leia got back to work, thinking that was the end of it.
How wrong she was.
While the hotel had kept their promise and only posted it on their social media page after the event ended a week later, apparently all it took was one journalist following the events of the political summit to find the video and make an online article about it for the thing to go viral.
Leia mentally kicked herself.
Of course there would be journalists drawn to this event, and of course they would know where the guest Senators and Jedi Master would be staying.
A momentary lapse in judgment while her head was full of all the politics had caused a lot of unwanted publicity for her brother.
It was fortunate she had the foresight of forbidding publication before the end of the summit, otherwise it would have disrupted everything, with paparazzi descending on the hotel like a feeding frenzy of ravenous sharks.
Luke was understandably huffy with her when they spoke via holocom, brows furrowed in annoyance as he berated her for not asking his permission for the hotel to post the video.
It was one of the few times Leia had ever screwed up like this and she felt terrible.
Privacy breach aside, she could tell through their Force bond that he was also just embarrassed, believing the holo now made him look silly to the rest of the galaxy.
All she could do (after apologising profusely) was assure him that wasn’t the case and people liked seeing the more ‘normal,’ relatable side of him.
That wasn’t a lie, but she reached a point where it was best to hold her tongue on the issue, certain that elaborating with full the truth wouldn't make him feel any better.
Because in actuality, all the holo had really achieved was dialling up his attractiveness factor, according to his fans.
Leia had scrolled through the comments on the video herself. No one said anything about his Jedi image being tarnished. Instead, people were waxing poetic about his smile, gushing over how adorable he was, how he was such a sweet uncle and would make the softest daddy ever, women were volunteering themselves to make him a daddy and feed him fruit everyday, etc.
There were also many expressing their rapt appreciation for his body and lamenting the fact that, most of the time, his full Jedi ensemble plus the cloak covered it up. An online poll had even been created, asking if people thought he should keep his current Jedi attire or ditch the cloak and have something more form fitting, with less layers. Needless to say, the votes were in favour of the second option.
Some guy who reacted to holonet footage of people with either red or green flags had taken a snippet of the holo and made a post on his channel, declaring Luke a green flag guy and calling him a 'cutie-patootie,' finishing with the line "get honey-roasted!"
This was easily one of the nicer, more wholesome reactions.
Perhaps it was just as well that Luke deliberately steered away from looking himself up on the holonet and reading people's comments on any media involving him - because some of the thirsty messages coming out from this incident alone would scare and disturb him enough, he may never want to set foot outside of Mandalore ever again.
After everything she had read following her hotel holo blunder, Leia couldn't very well blame him for that. It was hard enough reading these comments as his sister!
While she could see that her brother was indeed a very handsome man (especially with the level of fitness that being a Jedi required), and 'cutie-patootie' summed him up quite accurately, surely being a Jedi and war-hero would earn him some respect?
How can there be so many people posting such vulgar things about a man they owed so much to? Was nothing sacred anymore?
Leia resolved to take a more active role in protecting her brother from the worst of the holonet.
It was the least she could do.