... long time ago, in the clutches of the First Order...
"Anything I can help you with…?"
"I'm here to fix that," I said pointing at the smouldering wall behind him, "so maybe save the attitude."
Pointedly ignoring the man I looked around searching for any machine that needed my immediate attention, but there just didn't seemed to be anything. Great. So it was the other kind of a problem and I was going to spend some pretty claustrophobic moments stuck between the wall panels replacing slashed cables.
"Haven't we met before…?" I asked him, since he didn't look like he was planning to leave. "A few days back…? When I still believed I was going to be a civilian, like my father before me. I was so young and naive then," I added smiling to myself as I gestured to the droids, showing them which panels I needed removed.
"That was last week."
"Exactly," I replied with the appropriate level of bitterness. Level which could only be described as off the charts. "I mean just look at this. Can't whoever is supposed to be running this operation just confiscate his damn toy…?"
"That would be me," he said.
I blinked in confusion and momentarily lost my interest in the damaged wall.
"Yeah, right," I grinned, giving him a long, considering look. "You know, it would be really impressive if that were true. But even with my limited knowledge of how evil armies work I can tell you're too young to be holding that kind of job. Unless there's an evil Battle School I don't know about…"
"Battle School…?" he frowned.
"You know… A place where they take your regular model kids and turn them into brilliant military strategists. Because that's what evil governments do. Probably just for the sake of being evil, too. I mean who needs a childhood? Come to think of it, the Jedi were running a very similar operation. Oh wow… dark…" I said, mentally cringing at the connection I just made. "Let's pretend I didn't go there."
"Let's pretend you have a job to do," he said pointedly.
I rolled my eyes. "Right. And I'm willing to do it. It meaning being stuck in a very narrow space for hours and right at the edge of a panic attack the whole time. Doing all that while there's melted metal dripping all around me is where I draw the line. Besides – I already reached my quota of life-threatening injuries for this week. That one too," I added speaking to the droid that was getting rid of the wall insulation.
Seeing they were just about done with that I stripped off my jacket, tied my hair back with a strip of fabric that used to be a part of the original uniform they gave me – one that turned out to be more flammable than was good for it – and proceeded to crawl into the tangle of cables no longer hidden by the wall panels.
"So let's pretend I believe you're in charge here," I said after I took a quick look and got out to find him still in the room and glaring into the middle distance. "That would make you the person to talk to about getting discharged, right? Dishonorably discharged… for really bad attitude…?" I added hopefully.
"No."
"No, you're not the person to talk to or no, that's not happening? Oh," I said, seeing the answer in his expression that did not change the slightest bit. "So I guess I'm here for life."
"For as long as you're useful. You stop being useful fixing things, the only other use the First Order has for you is as a live target."
"Yeah, you definitely went to an evil Battle School," I said, unable to help myself. Luckily the droids began beeping at me before I could add anything more. "Oh come on," I said in reply to their rising panic and quickly walked closer to the partially-dismantled wall to double-check.
"What is it?" he asked.
"Oh, you know. Bad news. Bad news," I added for emphasis, since he didn't seem to be quite getting the seriousness of the situation. "We need to get this under control before the life support system starts acting up. Who has the blueprints? Oh… oh no… How are we still alive?" I said scrambling for the wall. I spent a tense few seconds looking for a very important off-switch that definitely shouldn't have been hidden behind all this crap. And as usually when I found myself in a situation like this – one in which I wasn't entirely sure how was I not seeing my life flash before my eyes yet – I decided to keep talking as though I had nothing better to do.
Granted, it was one insane coping mechanism, but I was yet to find anything better. "So…" I said, fishing in my memory for a second, "Hux? I was being serious, you know. Someone better confiscates that lightsaber. I mean that thing does serious damage. It definitely shouldn't be handled by someone this… irresponsible… Dammit…!"
"What happened?"
"I broke a nail," I replied. "You know, you are so lucky I'm a captive. If I wasn't I'd be demanding a raise right about now…"
I would add more but things took a turn for critical over here. I took me a second before I found myself complaining about life, the universe and everything again. Which was exactly when he decided to freak me out by actually putting some effort into upholding his side of the conversation. "That's about enough of that," he said in a tone that made me certain he was talking about my attitude.
"Are you seriously trying to give me the I have the authority to end you if you don't behave speech? Because if you are I have to say I love your timing. Also I just made sure you'll still have air to breathe five minutes from now," I said as I emerged, looking a mess between my scraped knuckles and my slightly burnt hair, not to mention the nail that turned out to be a lot worse than I first realized. "Oh this is just perfect."
"You are…" he started, his glare intensifying.
"Oh let me guess – all the things I told you I was…? You know, back when you still could send me back? Well, what do you expect me to do? Apologize? Promise I'll wear my uniform like I'm supposed to and don't talk back when Phasma's clearly making faces at me underneath that dumb helmet? Do I look I have time for any of that with stuff breaking all of the time?" I said in a rush. "Because I'm not going to do any of that. I'm already putting in some serious hours fixing all your broken equipment, not to mention cleaning up after that menace of a Sith. I'd think that was plenty."
Part of me knew this was my suicidal tendencies talking even as I was saying all this. But I simply couldn't make myself shut up. Not even after his expression assured me the next words out of his mouth would be orders to assemble a shooting squad for my execution. "Oh what…?" I said angrily to the droid that picked that exact moment to start beeping.
The news it give me were not good. I forgot I was in the middle of an argument and followed it to the faulty connection it seemed so damn worried about.
"I'm going to need a full report on this," said Hux about a minute later, startling me. I was already so caught up in glaring at the uncooperative machinery I completely forgot he was in the room.
"And I'm going to need sweets. I can't work under these conditions…" I said before I remembered this was no time to be manifesting my personality. "I mean – yes, sir."
He glared. No change there, then. "Did you actually restore the life support system?"
"Of course I did. Do you think I would do this on purpose?" I said, showing him the damn near torn off nail I earned just a minute ago.
He didn't. Or if he did, he didn't call me on it. He also finally left, which made doing my job a whole lot easier.
A minute later I managed to forget all about him and what probably was a very dangerous situation I just barely escaped with my life. It was damn near impossible to think of things like that with all these droids beeping bad news at me left and right.
… meanwhile in the Ileenium system…
"Oh… I actually completely forgot that happened," I said, smiling to myself. "It was so long ago."
"How the hell did you survive?" said Freya, speaking very slowly, carefully pronouncing every word. I wished I could give her an answer, because she sounded like she really needed one – like the universe wouldn't make sense to her until she had some explanation. But the truth was I had nothing.
"Did you just shrug?" she said, sounding both angry and slightly dazed. "Don't do that. That's not an appropriate reaction. I mean… how? How am I talking to you right now? You should be dead."
"I know, right?" I said, doing my best not to follow that with a laugh, since I could tell she found all this really troubling.
"I might have a theory or two," begun grandma.
"No," I said simply. I might have been in a spectacular mood sitting here bathed in the starlight, but that didn't mean I was going to tolerate any force talk. Which was clearly where this was headed.
"But you don't talk like that to people who have the power to have you killed. I mean, of course you do," corrected Freya, rolling her eyes. "But…"
"Look, I've been told Kylo Ren put in a good word for me. Which is… strange. And has nothing to do with the force," I added, before grandma jumped on that remark. "Maybe he just felt bad about all that property damage."
"Yeah. Siths are notorious for that kind of thing," said Freya, sounding eerily like I would if I was my usual thorny self.
"Well, that's the best explanation I was able to come up with," I shrugged. "I mean… whatever he saw in my head must have told him I'll be more useful alive."
"What?" said Freya. She looked like she was ready to grab me and shake me until I took this seriously. "What do you mean whatever he saw in my head…?"
"Oh, come on. That is definitely something Siths are notorious for so don't look at me like it's the most shocking thing you heard all day. Of course he dug through my head. Wouldn't you?"
"You could tell you had a Sith digging through your head?"
"Well... I could tell something strange was going on, yeah."
"And you're just mentioning it now?" said Freya, her tone of angry disbelief making me grin. "Like it's no big deal."
"Because it isn't. Siths read your mind. It's part of their whole thing," I shrugged again. She glared. Apparently doing that was still not in sink with the tone of this conversation.
"Will you stop shrugging. This is serious…"
"No it isn't. This is… over," I said, still amused at her I-can't-believe-this-expression. "Nothing we can really do about it. Other than yell, that is. But since you're taking care of that I'll just…"
"Oh don't. Don't just look up at the stars like this conversation is over. It most definitely isn't. And don't even think about trying to sell me this whole attitude. You should be worried. You should be wondering about all the things I'm wondering about. Grandma," added Freya, turning to her once she caught up with how easy I found it to ignore her little speech, "tell her. She can't just sit here and pretend everything's alright."
"I don't think that's what she's doing, dear," said grandma calmly. "I suspect she's too busy enjoying the show."
I smiled to myself, but forced myself not to look at Freya. Gran wasn't entirely wrong about that – I did have a great time witnessing this. It almost felt like seeing myself during one of my I'm-just-going-to-yell-at-this-until-it-goes-away moments.
"How can you be this calm?" said Freya accusingly once she was done glaring at grandma.
"I don't know," I shrugged. "Maybe because I'm safe and my life has a purpose and the stars are so beautiful tonight. And it doesn't matter how is any of this possible – it really doesn't. Yes, I shouldn't have been able to annoy the hell out of a guy who casually destroys whole systems and live to tell the tale. But I did. I'm still doing it even now as I sit here. He's somewhere out there furious about the fact that he simply doesn't know which planet to blow up to rid the universe of me. Feeling calm about it is the appropriate reaction."
"Do you even know what appropriate means?" said Freya, exasperated.