Star Wars: I Am a Slave ✓

Chapter 18 - Lift-Off

The next morning Rey woke up late, utterly exhausted. She took the speeder out to the X-Wing she was working on, with a can of lubricant in hand for that frozen bolt. The sun was already high in the sky, and the sweat was dripping from her face as she sped across the dunes.

After an hour of travelling, she pulled the speeder over to the snub fighter. She opened the access hatch and sprayed lubricant on the bolt. After waiting a minute for the oil to work, she turned her spanner on it. While not entirely smooth, the bolt did move. After a minute, she was able to remove the bolt entirely.

Rey twisted the bolt, washer, and nut back together and shoved them in her bag. She left the bag hanging on the seat of the speeder before returning to the engine.

Rey braced her legs in the sand, spread far apart for balance and leverage. She grabbed the engine lip with her hands, the hot metal warming her skin. Tugging, the engine moved a few centimeters. Rey removed her hands, shaking them in the air to cool them off. A few minutes later, she started the process again.

After an hour, the sun was at its zenith, and the engine was only half-way out. Rey's skin had turned pink from the sun. Her back ached, her fingers and palms burned from the hot metal of the engine, and she was hungry.

Rey placed her palms on the hull of the engine near the junction of the craft. The metal there was not nearly as hot as the lip. Rey hugged the engine with her bare arms, biting back the pain from the hot metal. She tugged on it until it fell to the sand in front of her.

Unable to handle the pain of the metal anymore, she let go of her hug on the engine and looked at her arms. The skin burned and blistered before her eyes. She grabbed the Bacta tube out of her bag and slathered it on her burns.

"That was stupid, Rey," she told herself as she thought about how she was going to get the engine back to the other X-wing two kilometers away. It was too big to fit in the storage net on the speeder. If she dragged it across the sand, she would have to clean all of the sand out of it before installing it in the other craft.

Rey decided to strap it to the hood of the speeder. After wrapping tension straps around the engine, she climbed on top of the hood and pulled. The engine would not budge a centimeter. She pulled again, lost her balance, and ended up falling to the sand.

Dusting the sand off, she stood and walked around the speeder to the engine. She climbed back on top and closed her eyes. She stretched her hand in front of her and felt around her with the Force. As she moved her hand up, the engine rose slightly. Shocked, she opened her eyes, only to see the engine fall back to the sand, spraying grains of sand into her eyes.

Rey growled and set about it again, with the same results. She just wanted to go back to her walker and forget all of this, but she knew the engine would be gone tomorrow if she left it here by itself today.

As she was about to try again, Ani appeared in front of her. 

"Where have you been?" Rey growled.

Ani raised his eyebrows and responded, "Here and there."

"Well, I could use your help." Rey grunted, frustrated.

"No"

"What?"

"No, you are capable of doing this on your own, Rey." Ani folded his arms in front his trust. "I will not help you when you can do it yourself. As a wise master used to tell me all the time, 'Do or do not. There is no try.' Now, again. Become one with the Force."

"It's too big, Granddad."

"Stop that. No whining. It's not too big. Size does not matter. The Force surrounds it and penetrates it. No matter how big, the Force is adequate. When you are at peace, the Force will respond. Now, again."