The first time Rey lost hope was when she was alone. She had been left there, nothing to her name but some clothes, a broken blaster, and a rebellion helmet. She trudged through the sands of Jakku, five years old, barely able to walk because of how small her legs were and how tired she was and how hot the sun was and everything everything was too too much.
But wait…an abandoned ship. She was all but crawling through the deep, twisting sands to get to it. The helmet went onto her head and the long-broken blaster was tied to her back as she made her way inside. It was mildly cool, compared to the surface of Jakku, a bit stuffy, but there was no wind and she could lay down.
Every instinct told her she was alone, that her family had given her this planet to be forgotten on. The sand was everywhere, and she cried for what felt like days. It had been so long already. Sitting in that ship by herself? She had nothing to say for herself except that she wanted to go home to a family that loved her and would take care of her.
The second time Rey lost hope was when she only got a quarter of a portion for an entire day's work. She tore apart a ship with her little hands, okay not a whole ship but part of one, and lugged the hot metal through the desert. She dared not walk too fast, or she might slip and lose her valuable scrap.
She arrived to trade and received a measly meal, barely enough to survive on. And considering her size, that meant something. She mixed and formed the loaf, downing it as if it were the ambrosia of a god or the essence of the Force. But no, it was a scrap of a meal. Going to sleep hungry as she was made her cry again. Why would anyone who loved her leave her to eat scraps of a greedy tyrant?
She remembered what had happened the next morning, sitting for much longer than she should've if she wanted to eat, crying away water that shouldn't've been wasted because she felt so utterly alone again. It was hard enough to live here, but to know she'd been left behind was the worst.
The third time Rey lost hope was when she had to fight just to dig out some scrap metal. On her newest site, a downed ship from the old wars, she found other scavengers. There was no law on Jakku, but others should've known better than to pilfer from a nine year old.
She grabbed a big stick and ran at them, screaming the whole way and ramming the weapon into them. She had scared and hurt them just enough to make them scamper, using her weapon as a thing to lean on as she recovered. Her heart was beating faster than it had in awhile, she could hear it in her ears. Her blood was rushing and her face was flushed.
She went back to her pile of scrap. In four years, she'd never felt more tired than this. Tired of fighting just to get the parts - which she could now distinguish more easily what was of value - that paid for her one, sometimes two, meals a day. She kept the metal rod, using it to propel her footsteps through the sand and drag her pile of miscellaneous parts. Her muscles ached and her lip was about to split, but she still waited in line for her turn to get her portions.
She realized once again how simply alone she was. She had had to fight for this, she was ready to beat someone with a metal rod for this. Her survival depended on her will to continue. And, for the first time since she'd been dropped in the sand, she convinced herself, for a full second, that no one was coming to save her.
The fourth time Rey lost hope was when she forgot what her family's faces looked like. She'd held onto the images for so long. Seven years, but she was twelve and suddenly her family's faces were a haze. She was even starting to doubt they existed.
She spent the day trying to remember them, but it was like grasping at water dripping from a luggabeast's mouth. It slipped through her fingers, and she stifled her inevitable crying. She had to work on things, but for the second time since she was dropped here she had the thought that she was alone. That no one would come to get her. This time it was for three seconds. Those three seconds were the longest she'd had in awhile.
By the end of the day she was grinding herself through the sand just to get what she knew wouldn't be enough for the next morning. But she could handle one meal a day. With her portion - a whole portion, thankfully - she settled back into her AT-AT. She ate her food quietly, marking her day on the wall. After finishing she sat her old rebellion helmet in her lap, just wondering. What was it like to be in the rebellion? To have a purpose greater than just surviving every day? She just couldn't know.
The fifth time Rey lost hope was when she marked day 5000 on her wall. She remembered every hundred marks she made. And this was the 50th time she'd made a hundred marks.
She knew her family was coming for her…but wasn't 5000 days enough? Could they come for her? Why couldn't they be there, to remind her of their faces? These questions buzzed around as she stared at the mark. It was getting dark in the night, and she just looked over the walls. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she'd counted wrong, she couldn't be at 5000 yet.
She spent the next…however long it was counting each mark she'd spread all through the ship. And she made it to her newest mark, counting 4996, 4997, 4998, 4999, 5000. Exactly. It was late already, and so she laid down to sleep. Staring at the ceiling. Five thousand days plus five years. What was that? 6825. Her life was 6825 days long so far. 18 years plus almost 7 tenths of a year.
It was 5000 days that her family had left her alone. And this time, for a full minute, she allowed herself to think they weren't coming for her. That this sand was going to be all she would see for the rest of her life. During that minute, she cried again. Just a few tears. But she didn't believe it anymore or cry anymore after that minute. She knew they were coming for her, she just didn't know when. She'd wait another 5000 days if she had to.
The time that Rey regained all the hope she'd lost in those long years was when someone else tried to hold her hand and help her even when there was no reason why he should care.
With Finn, from the resistance, the real, real resistance, and one of their agents was there helping her. He was giving her hope that the droid she'd found might be helpful to make a part of a better future. The rebellion wasn't just history, but they were fighting the First Order, and it would be like all the stories she'd heard from others and pieced together before she slept.
Even if everything was going wrong, this bizarre series of events that put her life in danger were giving her the hope that maybe her family didn't need to come and get her. She could go forward and be her own person, and she'd make herself a legend too.