Rey's Ghost
Rey was so, so tired. She'd been walking all day, and she had climbed her way right up into this great big old freighter, up through ventilation shafts and maintenance tunnels that had already been scavenged. There were no more wires or any good bits to take, not even the gross panel screws or the little pieces of rusty metal that Unkar said were like broken credit chips: barely worth anything, but still something. Rey now scrambled up over some ruptured seat cushions, along the listing floor of what was once the freighter's cockpit, putting her feet carefully one in front of the other in her scuffed shoes that were getting too small.
The ship creaked, and Rey kicked at a loose piece of stuffing with a quiet curse she'd heard from one of Unkar's men. "Kriff."
Her parents wouldn't like that she'd picked up talk like that, when they came back. She wouldn't let them hear her swear, though.
She just hadn't found a blasted thing. Nothing in this whole dumb freighter left for her to scavenge, not even broken-credit pickings. She trudged up the tilted floor anyway, intending to look at the control boards – probably there would be pickings there, surely no one could have got it already.
She slipped on a blasted stupid bit of grease. She slipped and skidded partway down the cockpit and caught her arm on a twisted part of metal from a panel, and there was a feeling of surprise and then discomfort and she caught herself and looked at the inside of her arm, and there was a lot of blood. Everywhere.
Then it hurt, hurt like a sandstorm all pressed into her arm and scouring at her skin and it wasn't fair, she wasn't even going to get pickings and her arm hurt and there was a whole awful lot of blood and she was shaking, too, she'd never cut herself this bad before.
It was so embarrassing, too, she started to cry.
That was when the ghost came.
She was shaking and holding onto the metal thing she'd cut herself on and trying to decide how to get back when she had nothing at all, and she saw something silvery-blue. She went very still. If it was another scavenger, they would kick her out and take anything left and she'd be empty-handed and hurt. So she gulped back tears and clenched her fists and breathed very raspy.
But then the silver-blue came closer, and she saw it was not a scavenger. She didn't move still, because she didn't know what it was, but it looked like a man, and she could see through it. If he was a man, he looked like quite a nice man. He had a beard, and very soft-looking clothes, and a warm smile that made his whole face look comfortable, and his eyes were very bright.
Rey could see through him, though, so he was quite obviously a ghost.
"Hello there," he said, when he got close, and his voice was also quite nice and comfortable. Rey shrunk back, though, because nice people shouldn't be see-through. "You seem to be a bit lost."
"I'm not lost!" she protested, pressing her hand to her arm. "I came here on purpose. You're sick."
"I'm not sick," he said, mildly, crouching in front of her. He reached out with his ghost hand for her arm, and Rey flinched. "Do you mind if I help you?" he asked.
"I don't have anything you can take," she said, warning, very proud. "I'm not giving you anything so you can go away."
"Well, Rey, you can see I wouldn't make a good scavenger. I don't want anything from you. I'll be very careful?" The ghost really did have a comfortable face, so Rey nodded, and he reached out and touched her arm. She felt something cold, like nice cool water when she could get it, and then all the blood stopped and the burning and pain, and she shivered and sat very still.
"How did you do that?"
The ghost smiled. "You'll know eventually. Come on, Rey of Jakku, I'll show you where you can find some… pickings, you call them?"
Rey thought the ghost was crazy, but she got up and followed him. She sure had no good ideas. As they went, she asked him his name, since he already knew hers.
"Oh, I'm Obi," he said, very fondly. "I'm sorry, I should have introduced myself already."
Rey told him she didn't care much. "Just show me the scavenging and we can both go, Obi."
For some reason, that made Obi laugh at her, but he did. They went through some tight places, which Obi just ghosted through, and then he showed her where to poke past a grating and there was a whole mess of wires and gears and leftover pieces.
"Thanks, Obi!" she told him.
He messed up her hair, he just rubbed her head and made a mess of it. Rey glared at him, but he had such a friendly smile and he was chuckling so she just sort of grinned back and then grumbled curse words to herself so he knew she was mad.
After that, Rey saw the ghost a few more times. Ghost Obi was her best friend besides her toy pilot, but ghost Obi only showed up when she was scavenging. He liked the ships, she thought. Once she asked him why he haunted all the ships.
"Perhaps," he told her, "I'm just haunting you." Then he messed her hair up again. He liked to hug her, which was always weird because she couldn't exactly feel him, mostly, but she felt softness and niceness. Sometimes she called him the nice ghost. Or ghost man. Or dumb ghost, when he snuck up on her in a dark corner while she was getting wires.
"You should go haunt someone else," she muttered. "I don't need you." She thought he would be lonely when her parents came back, so he should haunt someone who would stick around.
"No, of course not," he told her. "You're quite brave all on your own."
"That's me," she said, and jumped off a metal beam to prove it. Ghost Obi made a disapproving noise. He did that a lot. "I'm brave."
"Yes." Obi disappeared. He did that a lot too.
But unlike everybody else, Obi always came back. It just took him a while, mostly. Rey sometimes thought he came to help her, specifically. He was her friendly haunting ghost.
Once he haunted her house. She cried herself to almost-asleep and then there was Obi, sitting, with his very nice smile and his soft beard and big long clothes. Rey was beginning to think he wasn't real. Nothing and no one so nice belonged on Jakku.
"Why are you in my dumb house?" she asked him. She was mad. He was stupid, like everyone else. She should leave and never come back, because wasn't that what everybody did? Nobody wanted to stay on Jakku except her and Unkar and her parents. She bet Obi didn't want to be here either.
"I came to visit you," he said. "Do you want to sit with me, Rey?"
"No," she told him. She pulled her knees up to her chest. "Go away, I bet you want to."
Obi was sitting cross-legged, very neat, and he reached over and mussed her hair as always. "Sit with me, Rey."
She did. She scooted over and sat cross-legged too and folded her hands like she had seen him do, and then she closed her eyes because she saw her ghost friend had his eyes closed too. She felt warmer, then. Not so alone or cold, because of Obi, she was pretty sure. She breathed in, and out, and in, and out, and then it was morning.
She was wrapped up all warm, and Obi was gone.
But she felt alright. He'd come back.
He didn't stop coming back until she was old enough that she'd begun to think he was a hallucination. She had been young and losing a lot of blood, and really, there were strange things in the world, but ghosts… Having a see-through, magic friend was for kids, and Rey had the business of surviving to worry about.
He came back once, when she hadn't gotten as many portions from Unkar as she expected. She was sitting outside her hut and there he was, suddenly, sitting next to her. She still thought he had a kind, kind face. But of course he wasn't real.
"Look how brave you've been, Rey," he said. He did sound proud.
She didn't answer. He wasn't real, and she couldn't pretend. She had to wait for her parents, that was all – no use playing games about ghosts that healed you.
"You won't always be here. I promise." He touched her shoulder, with that odd cool softness, and she wrapped her arms tightly around her knees. "You will get to leave someday. I think you'll like it out there. I had a friend from a desert planet, once. He loved grass."
"What's that?" Rey asked, despite herself.
"You'll see," he said, with a funny smile. He looked sad. "These days were important, though, do try not to forget."
"Why would I want to?" she muttered.
"These are your first steps." He stood, touched her head for just a moment, but he didn't mess up her hair. Because he wasn't real.
Then Obi was gone. Of course he'd never been there at all.
Rey saw her friend standing next to Luke's ghost. Luke was waiting for her at the entrance of the temple they'd been rebuilding, looking so proud, and next to him was Obi. He was smiling, still the nicest sort of smile, and he looked almost smug. Rey touched the scar on her arm and thought of him saying, "You'll know eventually."
She supposed she did.
"Hello there," she said.
Obi chuckled and nodded, warm and fond.
"Do you know," she told them both, walking forward, grinning, "I really do like grass."
"Welcome home." Obi hugged her, and he messed up her hair. And it was good.
A/N: This work was inspired by a piece by saberhilt on Tumblr and hasn't been edited hardly at all. Hope you enjoyed! Please review!