Star Wars: I Am a Slave ✓

Chapter 4 - Hide and Seek

Tonight was another night of being locked in her special place—the cellar. Rey was sure that Unkar thought the cellar was a punishment for her, or at least a prison to keep her out of the way. However, for Rey the cellar was her special place with Ani.

As Rey climbed down the ladder through the trap door, she took in a deep breath of the cool cellar air. She shut the doors above her, standing on the ladder, taking a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Once adjusted, she carefully moved down the rungs. She then realized that the crates had been moved from where they were this morning.

"Ani?" Rey called out. "Ani! Where are you?"

Ani spoke in her head. "Find me."

"It's so dark down here. I can't see your light." A whine accompanied those words. "Stop hiding, Ani."

"Rey, your eyes can deceive you. Don't trust them," Ani said. "Use the Force, like I showed you."

Rey took a deep breath and focused as Ani had been teaching her these last few months. It was never easy for her doing it this way, but she was learning how to use the Force to avoid Unkar. Time to find Ani.

As Rey hurried around the dark cellar, she stubbed her toe on a crate she did not see. "Ow!"

"Use the Force, Rey. Feel the crates around you, and avoid them."

Rey growled at him but pushed on through the dark chamber. After stumbling a few times on the uneven stones of the floor, Rey quickly ran around a stone support pillar and pushed a shipping crate out of the way to reveal Ani. He had covered the area he was hiding in from head-to-toe so that his blue aura would not give away his location.

She grabbed him, or at least his Force barrier that he kept around his arms while she was with him. "Gotcha!"

Ani knelt down and tickled her. Rey ran away, squealing and laughing until Ani caught her and tickled her some more. "Stop! I give up!" Rey said between giggles.

Ani sat up. "What do you want to learn tonight?"

"Not more lessons," Rey moaned.

"Yes, more lessons, Young Lady," Ani replied with a wink. "But this time a little different. Do you see all those crates?"

"Yes. Why did you move them everywhere?"

"You'll see. I'm going to give you a ten second head start. Go hide, and don't let me catch you."

Rey ran off, looking for a good hiding place. "No cheating, Ani."

"I won't," Ani said with a grin. "This time."

It took Ani a few minutes, but he finally found Rey behind some crates near the ladder to the trap door. As he reached to grab her, Rey ran out of his grasp and started climbing up a stack of crates a meter away.

She jumped to another stack of crates, holding on tightly as they tumbled to the ground. She rolled in a tight somersault and ran toward the other end of the cellar where the ceiling was higher and the walls were rough stone.

Rey glanced behind her, watching Ani close the distance. Then she looked up. There were no crates at this end of the room. Ani was closing in on her, backing her into a corner. She grabbed at the rough stone wall and found her tiny fingers could grab it.

She turned around and started up the wall, looking for notches in the wall until she could reach the wooden slats above that served as extra storage.

Just as Ani was about to grab her, she made it to the safety of the rafters. "Safe!"

Ani beamed in pride at his granddaughter. "That was good. That was really good. Way to think outside of your problems to the solution, you little Kowakian monkey lizard. Come on down, now, or do I have to come get you?"