INSTALLMENT 1 – MR. TESIG?

"Take a deep breath." The voice was trying to sound sincere, but something was missing.

"What do you see?" What was it I was supposed to be concentrating on?

"Just give it time, try to relax and focus." Time…..I need to get back to work soon.

"Just…breathe." Didn't she just say that? I popped open an eye. Just a bit. I saw her sitting across from me, but she wasn't looking at me. She wasn't even looking in my direction. My counselor was staring intently at her data pad. Finger flicking randomly. She didn't notice that I was watching her. I closed my eyes tightly for a moment and then opened them, looking directly at her.

"Ma'am?" My counselor looked up with a slight start, but quickly recovered.

"Did you focus in on what we talked about?" She was looking at me now.

I started to say something, then paused. I was having trouble collecting my thoughts. "Not really. It's hard to replicate in a setting like this. Sitting in a chair and trying to think of something isn't how the attacks come on. They just….happen."

I said the last part quietly. Thinking of an attack put a small catch in my throat. I didn't want to take it any further.

She sighed. "Look, Mr. Tesig…." Her data pad beeped and she glanced down at it, making a quick swipe before looking back at me. "It takes time. Let's call it a day and we'll try again next week, okay?"

I simply nodded and headed for the door, not before noticing that there was still twenty minutes of the allotted hour left. As I exited the counselor's office and headed into the waiting area, her Twi'lek assistant glanced up.

"Oh, hi! Mr...?"

She's young, I thought, and probably sees twenty people coming through here every day that look more or less like me. If not physically then mentally. "Tesig. Thackeray Tesig."

"Right, sorry." She smiled apologetically and looked slightly embarrassed. "Done already? Would you like to make an appointment for next week?"

"Um, I'm pretty busy. Work is picking up. How about I call and set something up when I know what my schedule is going to be?

Her brow furrowed a bit. "Okay, I look forward to seeing you again. Have a good week."

I smiled and walked out the door, which opened directly onto a side street in a modest business area of Lessu. The streets were moderately busy with a few hover crafts of various types floating lazily by. Traffic, both pedestrian and vehicle, wouldn't pick up for a couple of hours still, which was why I always scheduled my appointments earlier in the afternoon.

Sighing to myself and shoving my hands into my coverall pockets, I put my head down and headed back towards the hanger bays and maintenance docks. They were adjacent to the Lessu spaceport, which was where I had called home for the past two months. It wasn't that work was hard to come by. I had been turning Harris wrenches and pilot drivers with the best of them since my early teen years. It's just that, I couldn't seem to settle.

The counseling sessions weren't really doing that much other than taking an hour of my afternoon and generally leaving me in a state of agitation. It was the New Republic's effort to take care of veterans of the civil war. They meant well, but the quality of specialists was directly proportional to the distance from the core worlds. And Ryloth was pretty far out. This was only the most recent of more than a few. They were all the same, just focus on what caused the flash backs. Thing was, I didn't know what really triggered them. They just happened, no rhyme or reason. How can you recreate something that you can't predict?

I coughed to clear my head. It didn't matter, had work to do. I was working on the atmospheric flight control system of a freighter that had come in from Sullust. The repulsor drives wouldn't synch up with the vector thrusters, resulting in a very bumpy approach once the craft entered atmosphere. The navigation computer did not register the subtleties of the misalignment, almost as if it switched off once it realized it wasn't in space. Lazy assed computer, I smirked to myself.

And then it hit me. Maybe it wasn't a mechanical issue, but a software issue! The navigation computer more or less switched off once the ship dropped from space into atmosphere. What if it wasn't being lazy, but was confused? I'd bet a pint of the local brew that the freighter captain hadn't bothered to update the hyperspace maps lately, or at all for that matter. They don't change all that much besides minor updates to asteroid fields or comet trajectories. However, also included in those updates were software patches. Small patches on their own, but if not updated over a long period of time, then the computer was probably glitching. The vector thrusters weren't synching because the computer wasn't online providing nuanced guidance for manual pilot control.

Atmospheric flight was always interesting, maneuverability so different between space and various atmospheric types. Like on Hoth when we struggled so hard trying to adjust our fighters to extreme weather conditions…..

The attack hit. Delayed just enough for me to know it was coming, but too fast for me to do anything to prepare for it. My throat closed off. Trying to inhale was like trying to run through a wall. I veered off and leaned up against the side of a building. Wait for it to pass…the memory came flooding in.

"Just patch the damned thing already!" It was mere minutes since Rogue Squadron had taken off in an attempt to slow the Imperial assault, but it felt like an eternity. The evacuation had been chaotic, and the ground crews had been frantically working to ready the transport craft along with their X-Wing escorts. Concurrently, those same over worked ground crews were also preparing the T-47's for the anticipated ground assault. The climate of Hoth was just too much for the X-Wings. However, we figured out a couple of work arounds for the T-47's to keep them from freezing up. It was all we had.

None of this mattered to Laren Altaren, Rogue Squadron pilot currently without a flyable ship. We had cannibalized the beaten down 47's as much as we could to get the squadron up and flying. Ten made it up once the Imperial Walkers had been spotted on the North Ridge. Altaren's speeder had a bad actuator on his vector thruster. The result was a significant decrease in maneuverability, so bad that it was difficult to control the speeder in flight. Exacerbating the problem was that the coolant hose leading up to the actuator had multiple leaks. The coolant in this case, since Hoth was so cold, actually acted as a defroster. It kept the actuator, and thus the flight controls, functional. One of the many work arounds.

I put the last bit of shielding tape I had on the hose.

"Thack, are we good? I have to get up there!" Laren was nearly on my shoulders looking down at what I was working on.

"I think so. It's not going to hold long. Maybe ten minutes of flight? Laren, look. Get to the evac point and to your X-Wing. There's not much you can do at this point!"

He looked at me like I had just kicked his kid, of which I knew he had two. "Just a couple of runs, to buy a bit more time. Then I'll get to the evacuation point, I promise." His expression softened a bit. "You know I have to, you know how it is."

I did know, didn't make it any easier. "Two passes, then break contact. I'm heading to the south ridge. Boss lady will have my ass if I get on a transport after she does."

Laren grinned as he jumped in the speeder, firing up the thrusters. No tail gunner was around to join him. "I'd rather kiss a tauntaun than get on Nera's bad side. You're the best mech we have, Thack. First drink is on me next time around."

With that, he piloted his T-47 out of the hanger doors and away towards the fight…

My breathing slowly returned to normal. I could feel the cold sweat starting to dampen my coveralls. The playback in my head kept going though.

After Laren took off I made my way to one of the final transports to make it out. My boss, Nera Kase, was there just ahead of me, scowling at me and looking relieved at the same time. Imperial troops had stormed the base.

The transport I hopped on had a lot of the infantry on board that tried to hold the ridge for as long as they could. I overheard some of them talking about the air support, in particular one speeder. As they were running for safety, under direct fire from the AT-AT's, one lone speeder showed up, flying directly at the group of walkers. Most of the squadron had either been shot down or scattered. This guy showed up late. The AT-AT that had been directing its fire towards the ground troops had to make a sudden and awkward adjustment to meet the unexpected threat. The speeder took a direct hit and immediately spun over and nose dived straight into the ground. No opportunity to eject. A moment later, the lead AT-AT destroyed the shield generator.

According to the young grunt telling the story, it took a few moments AT-AT to readjust itself after downing the speeder and resume its forward march and fire. In those few moments, many of the fleeing rebels made it over a small ridgeline, out of the direct line of fire of the walkers.

"It was maybe ten seconds, maybe less. But that quick break from taking fire allowed us to make it over that ridge. I thought I was done, thought the whole squad was done. But we made it. I take back everything I ever said about pilots and how easy they have it." The kid, paused for a second, then up and walked out. Leaving the rest of the group alone in their individual worlds.

It was Laren. If I hadn't fixed his speeder he may still be here, I thought. But then a lot of those kids on the ground wouldn't.

I rubbed my eyes and blinked my vision clear in the waning daylight. In front of me was a blurry figure, slowly coming into focus.

"Mr. Tesig?" It was the young Twi'lek from the counselor's office.

I was immediately annoyed, borderline angry. I hated being seen like this. "What, you following me or something? I told you I'd be in touch!"

She looked taken aback by my outburst, but then her expression softened a bit. She looked genuinely concerned. "Mr. Tesig, you left the office nearly an hour ago. I'm off for the day." She cocked her head slightly to the side. "Are you okay? You look sick. Should I call someone?"

An hour? Great. I pinched the bridge of my nose and grimaced. The attacks were getting worse. Glancing up, I could see she was still in front of me, a concerned yet quizzical look on her face.

"Look kid, I'm sorry….I um. I have to get to work." With that I pushed past her towards the spaceport.

"Wait, Mr. Tesig! I can….." I didn't make out the last part of what she was saying, quickening my pace to get away. To her credit, and my relief, she didn't follow.

My brain was scattered. Muttering to myself, I wondered how I was going to be able to finish the day. Head down I pressed on, no really knowing what else to do.