One of the tanks in the back must have blown, that was my first thought. My second was that I was facedown on the floor. I coughed, and realized there was smoke everywhere. I pushed my head and shoulders out of the dirt, but my legs didn't respond. Looking down, it became very obvious I wasn't getting out of here without help. Not only did something blow up, but it brought the ceiling down. A huge chunk was pinning my one leg. There wasn't any pain, which made me panic a little. Ok, more than a little. The smoke was getting thicker, and I was getting a clearer picture of my situation. Our base was built into the landscape on D'qar, and my workshop was basically a single entrance cave. The explosion had crumbled the only way out.
Suddenly there was a loud beep. BB-8 had recovered from being tossed across the room. She tried to roll near me, but I stopped her. "Go get the jack," I croaked out, pointing to the corner of the room where it should be. I knew someone would be eventually clearing the doorway, but I could see fire creeping along the floor toward me, igniting everything it could touch. BB-8 returned, frantically beeping at me she had found the jack. Realizing she couldn't just grab it, I looked around. The chain would have to work. "You're going to have to roll very carefully and keep this chain out to your side." I reached as far as I could and clipped it to the ring she offered me. I heard the chain dragging as she rolled away, seeing every inch of ground she covered in my mind.
A wave of relief rolled over me as I heard the grinding of the metal wheels of the jack as it was pulled towards me. Slowly. Too slowly. Daring to look down, my one fear was crawling towards me faster than BB-8. The fire had reached the rock that pinned me, and began to lick into the space to my boot. I could smell burning plastic, although I couldn't feel anything. I flailed my arms around and realized I touched the portable water cooler. Hope flew back into my veins, and I started rocking the pedestal to release the water jug on top. It was heavy enough to flatten me, but… The fire chose that moment to ignite my pant leg, and I let out a scream as it began to burn my skin. With all my strength I tipped the jug down and it bounced off my shoulder, spilling all over me. I aimed the bottle down my leg, extinguishing the flame there for what I knew was only for a few minutes.
BB-8 whistled and gave me the chain. Pulling the jack over the rubble towards me, I jammed it into the crack and started pumping the handle. It just had to raise the rock a little bit… Each pump on the handle was a struggle. I was laying on my stomach, twisted and trying to get leverage to push it down. "Come on, dammit!" I yelled at the tool. As if it heard me, the jack moved the rock up just a hair, but enough where I could drag my leg out. My pants still smoking, I crawled over the rubble to BB-8 and together we made our way as close to the exit as we could get. I pulled my wet shirt up over my face so I could breathe a little better, but the smoke kept getting worse.
I started clawing at the dirt and rocks that covered the doorway. My fingers were bleeding, but I wasn't going to give up unless I passed out. Finding a loose circle of soil, my fingers wiggled through to cool air. And someone's hand grasped mine.
"I'm fine, I feel great, now Let Me Out Of Here!" I said loudly to the guard at the door. I don't know what he was smiling about. What a terrible job he must have every day. Keeping the nuts like me from roaming around. I wanted my own clothes, I wanted to take a shower by myself. 24 hours for observation was just too much to ask of me. I made my way back to my room, limping on one crutch. Maybe it would be easier with two crutches, but my shoulder hurt too much to use it today.
I collapsed halfway on the bed, my bad leg hanging off the side. Bored.
BB-8 suddenly rolled into my room, beeping happily. I squealed with happiness, and slid onto the floor to hug her. She was cleaned off, and rolled into my arms purring. We sat together for a few moments like that until firm hands grabbed me under my arms and pulled me up, only to push me onto the bed again. "I hear you're being a problem?" Poe said with a small grin, as he fondly ruffled the hair on the top of my head. He lifted both my legs back onto the bed and stared silently at the exposed purple blooms that spread up my thigh from the cast on my calf.
"Come on, you'd do the same thing. The broken leg is set, the bacta is taking care of the burn, and the rest is just bruises. I just want a real shower!" I said dramatically, hitting my head on the pillow for emphasis.
"Then why don't you take one? This is going to be the easiest place for you to do that."
"They keep sending in this really creepy guy, I don't want him touching my naked body." I gave a voluntary shiver for emphasis.
Poe sighed and closed his eyes. "Alright. Let me see what I can do." He walked down the hall to the nurse's station. He had just come from the investigative meeting on the explosion, where BB-8 had played the recording of the events that happened. Hearing her scream as she caught on fire bothered him more than he thought it should. He heard the final screams of many pilots as they plummeted toward their death. But her agony was still fresh on his mind, even if she didn't seem to be affected by her experience. He didn't know how she did it, since she had to be in constant pain. He hadn't wanted to make her uncomfortable when he had looked at her injuries, but it was all he could do to keep himself from tearing the rest of her robe off as he saw the bruises exploded in intensity above her knee. It made his stomach tighten to think about how damaged her entire body was. After a quick conversation at the desk in the hall, he returned with a bottle of soap.
"Your creepy male nurse was a female Gamorrean. Come on, I'll help you into the shower and you can take your clothes off in private." He pulled my arm over his shoulder and helped me hop to the washroom to sit down on the bench.
Sitting on the bench, I felt a little embarrassed. "It didn't really matter who they sent in. I just didn't want a sponge bath from some stranger," I admitted. Trying to perk up a little, I concentrated on the task at hand. "This is going to be a lot easier than I thought." I stuck my leg out to the side and he wrapped it snugly to the knee with a plastic bag they had given him. Handing me the bottle of soap, he started to walk out.
"Wait-can you get me some clothes from my room?" I gave him my best pity face, my eyes all wide and pleading.
Poe rolled his head on his shoulders in an exaggerated expression of annoyance. "Yessssss. Where are your keys?"
I smiled really big. "On the table next to the bed here," I said sweetly.
He closed the door behind him and I pulled off my robe. The worst section of me was my hair, since it was matted with soot and dirt. I doused it with soap, rinsing with the handheld sprayer. Four times. Yuck. Poe had gotten me a little scrubby to use on the rest of my body, which helped a lot. But it still seemed to take forever to finish. I wrapped a towel around me and waited for him to return.
The door opens a crack and his voice filtered in. "You decent? I've got some clothes."
"Yeah, come on in." He stepped in the room with a small pile of clothing. "I'm dry, just hand it to me," I instructed him. He placed the pile in my arms and raced out. I smiled to myself. He was too damn nice.
Looking through the pile, I found he had selected one of my tiny smiley t-shirts and a big fluffy sweatshirt. There was also a pair of shorts and one thigh high warm sock. How he managed to be thoughtful enough to bring the sock and not bring underwear was mind boggling. He'll face off a hundred guys trying to kill him but can't go through a girl's panty drawer. Whatever.
I got the clothes on and called to him to come get me. We did the awkward hop to the bed and I slid onto it. "I couldn't get the nice warm sock you brought me on in the tub. Can you go back in and get me a towel so I can dry my foot off?" I'm so demanding now that I have a willing body to help me.
He did, and I dried my foot off better. I pulled the sock on and stretched it up over my knee and up my thigh. "Ooooohhh that feels so much better," I moaned.
"You look so much better. You smelled really bad." He wouldn't look at me, and shoved his hands into his pockets.
"Poe, what's wrong? You're nervous about something."
"It's… you. I'm… messed up, I don't know." He plopped into the chair by my bed. The air around us became serious, and not as flippant as before.
"You were very thoughtful just now, no one has been that nice to me lately. Do you feel like you shouldn't be here? Because I don't know how to tell you how nice it is to see someone today."
"That's not it. I have a few things to tell you." He took a deep breath. "Thank you for getting BB-8 out before yourself. Not many people value the life of a droid."
"She saved my life."
"I know. I just came from a meeting where we watched the video BB-8 was able to provide of the whole thing. I can still hear you screaming…" He picked up two of my fingers as he said it, and began rubbing them his thumb over them. The sensation was enough to stop my breathing, but when I looked at his eyes I could see he was actually upset. About me-getting hurt.
I was silent. Blocking out the past few hours was what was keeping me going. The memory of the fire burning me came back, and replayed again in my head. And again. I couldn't seem to stop the loop. My chest tightened and I could feel the tears pushing at my eyelids. The burns on my leg under the bacta began to hurt, as if I had reminded my skin what had happened. I sniffed really hard and made myself take a breath. I still couldn't talk.
He continued. "It was the consensus of those present that the explosion was intentional. They are not sure if someone was trying to destroy something in the shop or if the target was you. It is possible someone could want to blame you for the death of a pilot who didn't come home, they might think your repair caused it. Until the committee can be sure, they are asking you to remain under guard.
I pulled my hand away from him and covered my face. "I try my best… I can't try any harder to do things right. Was there someone who really died because of a bad repair?"
"No. But that wouldn't keep someone from assigning blame if they were upset. The committee is just being cautious and they understand what kinds of emotions people go through after a death."
He paused. "And I have to leave in a few hours."
It suddenly became too much. I lost it, and started to cry. I hadn't cried when they set the leg, or peeled off the burned fabric, or scraped the melted plastic off my skin. (Don't think I didn't scream, but I did not cry) This was now just too much stress for me to handle.
Poe looked at me helplessly. It was too embarrassing to have him witness my ugly tears. I didn't want an audience. "Please just go, get out. Do whatever it is you have to do, it's probably important. I'll be fine. I got this."
He sat silently, and his face got dark. I think it was anger. "I didn't just come in here to be the messenger, you know. I wanted to see you, and so did BB-8. You keep walking out on me, and now that you can't run away you make me leave." He got up and stiffly walked out of the room. BB-8 spun her head back and forth from me to the empty doorway, obviously confused, then quickly rolled after him.