“Rex, don’t make a big fuss out of it,” she had said, sounding mildly annoyed after the rough week of hyperspace travel spent crammed into whichever tiny quarters ships, that brought them here, had to offer. Hitchhiking halfway through the galaxy because one screw got loose on the casing of a hyperdrive so old they couldn’t repair it wasn’t an experience Rex was keen on repeating. However, dealing with the consequences was equally as unpleasant.
The two stood in the middle of a dirty, cheap spaceport, somewhere not even located on a moon or a space station, but an asteroid whose surface was the whole spaceport and that didn’t even have an atmosphere and instead was protected by an artificial one.
Saying that Rex hated the place was a severe underestimation. The buildings were high and metal, open wiring everywhere, hangers as far as you could see (not that far actually, but it was still a lot). Accidents and angry people on every corner… Hundreds of ships parking in boxes stacked over each other, waiting for the night to pass or a clearance to take off. Every corner reeked of puke and garbage, discoloration caused by…something Rex wasn’t courageous enough to name, yet the signature combination of kerosene and oxygen veneered everything. This place was a melting pot of shady activities and way to lose your everything.
I mean, who would have thought? This was the last rest stop before the Outer Rim officially started, Rex thought to himself as Ahsoka scowled, presumably also regretting using this exact spaceport.
Fuck, Rex missed the warm quarters of the Ocytho, they sadly had to leave her and her broken hyperdrive casing behind. Alternatively, he also wouldn’t mind the Clockwise – not to be picky in moments like these. A warm meal, dry socks, an actual water shower… it’s the little things, Rex realised in this moment. It was probably the fourth time he did so on that day, but two (or four) are better than one, he guessed.
Focus, he told himself only moments after, this is how the shinies got shot, being distracted on the job, seriously Rex, you should know better than this. And with that, he grabbed Ahsoka’s hand and strolled to the information counter, ready to give a million credits to who get them off this not-even-actual-planet safely.
There were five thousand three hundred and two summer job options the holonet had spat out when Luke had typed in “piloting part-time arkanis sector” into the search machine, and yet, he had to chose the worst option. Taxi driving scum around for hours without end from the “spaceport of all possibilities” as it got called by the people passing by to nearby planets and moons sounded mediocre at best, but he got paid for it. However, Luke couldn’t but to feel out of place.
Truth was, he wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to leave for the Imperial Piloting Academy, but last-minute uncle Owen called it off. He had said that they’d needed him, that he should please understand that. Of course, he understood, a farm doesn’t run itself and yet, after Luke’s initial anger and disappointment wavered off, he had searched for alternatives and compromises. So, that was how he got to SP-GC2719-55b. An awful name, if you'd ask him. Force, in a thousand years he’d still be able to rattle off this particular string of letters and numbers, so often had he had to punch them into his satnav or state them on a counter.
Not now though, right now he was on his lunch break. His well-deserved lunchbreak, mind you, and not very happy about any kinds of interruptions. He simply wanted to spend his break with his back leaning on the Oil, the ship the company had given him at the start of his job, and his flight suit onesie stripped off to his hips. In his left he was holding a Tailla (a cooked fruit dissolving in a cup of hot juice), meanwhile his right he was holding a Jakit (a sandwich with bantha meat and blue cheese). Aunt Beru had given him both this morning, as well as the last six mornings on which he had left for his job and kissed his cheek.
“Don’t get chatted up and stay safe. Don’t fly too boldly and try to keep within the safety regulations,” she had said. Luke had obviously patted her hands away, Maker, he was almost seventeen, not twelve, but he had given both of them a goodbye kiss back. Then she had let him go, of course.
One really good thing about his job was that he had to leave early, which meant that he saw the sunsrise every day. He had to leave at the latest when Tatoo II became visible to make it on time. This, of course, also meant that Luke had to get up every day at ass-o-clock in the morning, but he forbad himself from thinking too much about it. Old Ben always said it was best to take the things the way they came to oneself, so he tried to adhere to this sentiment, even though it wasn’t always easy.
It especially wasn’t easy when your superior decided that your presence was demanded during lunch break and yelled your name through the entire hangar. Sighing, Luke put away his lunch and zipped his work clothing back on. He had no idea what for he was needed. With a quick pat on the bell of the tiny astromech the company too had lend him, he went off into the direction from which his name was called. R1, as the droid was called, had given him a tiny electric shock, probably because his clothing was all rubber and of course because the ancient astromech’s wiring was completely laid open. Luke wasn’t allowed to fix him, since it wasn’t technically his to fix, but he swore to himself he’d ask at the end of summer if he was allowed.
The hangar Luke needed to cross was full of naïve teenagers like him on their first summer job and also full of long-established pilots that have been flying from here for decades. In parking lot number three stood the Oil with R1, in slot number seventeen stood the Luttra, currently without her pilot Miatir, in slot number twenty-five stood the Copoda, whose pilot was over eighty nevertheless still kicking and still correcting Luke’s piloting form, and at the very back of the hangar in parking lot three hundred eighty-nine stood the Tigoteus, a ship that had been eyed by every person passing through. It was a big, well-polished and obviously loved research vessel, whose pilots only few had seen passing through the hangar. Absolutely no one could make sense of the fact that it stood on this quite sordid space station. Even so, Luke paid it no mind, it had been standing there for over a week, slowly he accustomed himself to its presence.
The hangar, as big as it was, eventually came to an end in the way of a wide hallway that looked exactly like the room Luke had just exited.
Really, he thought to himself as he made his way through to his superior’s door, do they know nothing about interior design?
He came to a stop on the left side no too far into the hallway. Quickly, he checked his hands: Not too greasy, not too oily, so he knocked on the door. The room he entered was nearly entirely to his right side, to his left was merely a whiteboard on the wall and a clothing rack behind the door. It was generally quite cold, the carpet made out of a scratchy fake wool and the walls a rejecting and pure white. To his right was a big, solid timbered secretary, on one side with a big chair on which his superior sat and on the other two smaller ones, on which two strangers sat.
There wasn’t another chair on which to sit down on, but Luke wasn’t asked to anyways, maybe for this very reason, maybe because his superior was an ass, he didn’t know.
“That,” his superior said, “is Luke, quite a fast one. Would his ability to transport you satisfy your needs?” his superior asked the two strangers. Luke studied them a bit closer. The one sitting away from him was a by the looks of it older human man, bald with a big beard wearing a poncho that absolutely didn’t lay on top of a breastplate, no officer. The one sitting towards him answered the question.
“Uh, yes, yeah I guess, thank you Mister Triobah,” she stammered then stood up and only then Luke was able to look at her correctly. She was a Togrutan woman, wearing a cloak and an elaborate headdress on blue and white montrals that made her so tall, she towered over Luke with a full head.
A hiring for transportation from the office of his superior? How unusual, it was much more common for this to happen in the open hangar under a ship’s belly with hushed tones. Either these people were important enough with their matters to make them private, or they were just awfully core. Probably the latter, Luke thought. It’s always the latter.
“Of course, Ma’am, Sir, where’s your target destination?” Luke chimed in.
“Tatooine, that’s 644.386; -673.274, I think.”, the man provided.
Oh Force, Luke thought, oh sweet Force.
“Of course,” he said politely with a nod into their direction, “if you would accompany me to the ship”
“Enjoy your trip,” Triobah said and let them exit with a faux smile.
Oh, sweet, sweet Force this would be a long trip.
Luke was sitting in the pilot’s chair at the very back of the Oil, while he checked all switches for the last time. The ship was very narrow, if you transported three people, otherwise it was okay.
Defensive Shield activated.
It was a Zwiisian Laser Fighter, shaped like a very thin and narrow triangle, perfect for fast routes and agile turns.
Hyperdrive set to multiplication factor eight hundred, all cooling systems running as they should.
The cockpit was located at the very back of the ship, but still in front of the boot. During flights one could feel the motor vibrating under one’s feet.
Joy stick and steering wheel set to idle, R1 thoroughly connected to all systems.
The front of the ship was reserved for the few passengers it could transport. In truth, Luke thought to have read somewhere that a Zwiisian Laser Fighter could hold up to five passengers, pilot included, but he had yet to see a person accomplish this.
Did he forget something? Oh! Air conditioning set to twenty-eight degrees standard.
The radio crackled, demanding to be answered.
“Flight coordination to Oil VUZ-608-34m, please confirm with your callsign," a tinny voice asked.
“Oil VUZ-608-34m is listening”
“Are you ready to be rolled out onto the runway?”
“Yes, Sir, we are ready for take-off preparations”
“Good, take-off in,” a pause whitenoise took over, “approximately twelve minutes, runway eight”
“Thank you, Sir”
He dropped the radio back into its hold. In the passenger room sat right now only the two strangers. Their knees were touching, a thing that probably wasn’t that comfortable, but they had yet to move. They weren’t exactly looking at each other but they also were not not looking at each other. It was hard to describe. Sometimes they looked at each other, sharing knowing glances that seemed to be entire conversations, then they looked away again as if to recharge or not to look too suspicious. Luke decided not to pay them too much attention, instead focusing on getting the ship ready. With a quick glance on his pre-flight checklist he turned a key, giving him manual control. He looked left out of the window, R1 was ready too.
“Alright Lady and Gentlemen, where are we flying to on Tatooine, or does it not matter?” The strangers seemed startled by his question, unsure looks in their faces.
“Uhm," the woman looked at the man.
"The Western Dune Sea,” he answered for her. A pause arose, “please,” he completed. Luke made a distorted grimace.
“Sorry, I can’t land in the Western Dune Sea, the ship would sink, the ground’s too soft”
“Oh, you know the land?” the women looked even more surprised now. Internally, Luke sighed. He really didn’t want to explain his living situation to anyone not from the planet.
“Yeah,” he explained cumbersome, “I guess a good pilot knows their way around”
“How true, how true,” the man murmured.
“Anyways, I can set you off in the Jundland Wastes, near the Western Dune Sea, but you guys don’t seem to have any transportations readily available once on planet, am I assuming correctly?” They nodded.
“Yeah, shit, I mean I could set you off in Mos Eisley, that’s southeast of the Jundlandwastes, and you can arrange yourself from there…”
Another silence nestled itself into the small room. His passengers looked at each other, conversing again without words. Right as the man was about to exclaim their findings Luke made another proposal: “You know what, I live in the Chott Salt Flats, that’s southern Jundland Wastes and I have a speeder, I can just drive you there, is that okay with you?”
“Of course, thank you very much kind sir,” the woman exclaimed, the man too looked relieved.
“First, you don’t need to ‘sir’ me, I am not even seventeen, and second, I’m Luke if I’ll show you my home, I think you deserve to know my name and I deserve to know yours”
“Why certainly!” he turned to his companion, “Ahsoka, we have terrible manners, we didn’t even introduce ourselves” She chuckled at that.
“You are so right, Rex,” she said to him, then to Luke, “I am Ahsoka,” she prompted her neighbour to continue with a look. “And my name’s Rex,” the man ended with a smile.
Luke grinned. “Nice to meet you!"
They seemed to be occupied with themselves again, eyes daring around the room, landing on each other every time, like before. Luckily the radio decided that this was the moment to demand to be answered, saving Luke from a conversational transition, the silence had started to become awkward.
“Flight coordination to Oil VUZ-608-34m,” the radio crackled.
“Oil VUZ-608-34m is listening,” the room had become entirely silent, Rex and Ahsoka must be listening too.
“Oil, are you ready for take-off?”
“Yessir”
“Good, safe trip, flyboy, you’re cleared and ready to go”
Luke blinked back an affirmative and Goodbye with his headlights, otherwise turned to his passengers.
“You probably heard the flight coordination, we’re ready for take-off. Please fasten your seat belts!”
Luke accelerated at first only a little, then a bit more, “In case of emergency there won’t be any masks dropping from the ceiling,” he informed Ahsoka and Rex in a teasing voice. The sparse luggage they brought with them started to rattle, now that they had lost the ground under their tires and the passengers had started to slip off their seats.
“Nor will there be buoyancy aids to get anywhere on this ship,” he continued. In a desperate effort to not fly off the seats, they had started to grip the armrests. “Although, there is one emergency exit. It’s the door from which we can in”
“That’s not what an emergency exit- “ Ahsoka wanted to protest, but the last acceleration cut her off.
After they both had caught themselves, Rex exclaimed: “There aren’t any seatbelts anywhere!”
“Yeah,” Luke answered. Rex seemed particularly thrown off by this answer. Ahsoka sighed.
“This is what you get if you chose the cheapest spaceport around,” she muttered to herself and because Luke was quite sure that the statement wasn’t meant for his ears, he didn’t mention it.
The kid was a terrible pilot. As if the horrendous start was only a prologue, travelling the first ten minutes was a mix of sharp turns and nothing but nauseating manoeuvres.
Rex hated it, he went through all of that shit once already with General Sithlord, thank you very much and he didn’t beg for another round. Ahsoka seemed to feel the same, although she looked to be holding herself with much more grace than Rex. Jetii osik, probably.
The peculiar atmosphere of travel just below hyperspace had nestled itself into the crammed room with ease. Characterised by the visual of planets passing by, the speed being still slow enough to recognise them and already fast enough to not be able to dwell onto them for too long, paired with the lack of any sound from outside the ship was truly something otherworldly.
The motor was humming under their feet, an occasional instrument would blink or make a quick noise and the kid would flip a switch while grumbling or write something down on a piece of paper hanging right next to him.
Luke let out concentrated huffs and grumbles as he had to steeply turn the ship around to still catch that exit. Ka’ra, had he ever heard of turn signals? Ahsoka and Rex didn’t talk, partly due to the fear of puking when opening their mouths, partly because it was a relic of all their stealth missions purely relying on nonverbal communication. When Rex thought about it, they were probably scaring the kid a bit, not talking at all yet understanding each other perfectly. Well, they were too far into their thing now to turn back.
Ahsoka sighed and bumped her head to the window. Rex smiled. This was going to be a long trip if spent in silence.
Luckily (or not, depending on whether or not you liked small talk), the kid seemed to feel the tension too and decided to do something against it.
“So,” he asked, “do you guys have any music wishes?”
“Seriously?” Rex groaned, one eyebrow exorbitantly high in the air.
“Would you rather ride the remaining ten minutes in silence?”
“Don’t you have radio connection?”, Ahsoka, bless her soul, mediated.
“Sure, but there’s not that many radio stations on the outer rim,” the kid shrugged.
“Yeah, which ones do you have?” Ahsoka shot Rex a glance as if to ask him if he were getting competitive there. He shot her a glance back as if to tell her to shut up.
“Uh,” the kid stammered, “well, we only really have one, because only one of the Empire’s channels reaches that far, and otherwise you can listen to a lot of amateurs radioing into the void, I’ve made some friends that way too!”
Thinking of Zep and Tiiko always made him happy, he really couldn’t wait for their next transmission to arrive, assuming that there wouldn’t be a sandstorm hindering him from receiving but until now he had been lucky.
“But honestly,” he continued, sarcasm lining his voice, “that’s nothing against the radio connection we have on Tatooine during sandstorms, which is to say, none”
“Wow, you live on that shit hole?”, Rex asked.
“Yes Sir, I do.”
“And I’m figuring that you want to leave as fast as possible?”, Ahsoka chimed in.
“You are guessing correctly,” the grin on his face could be heard through his voice, “actually I’m only doing this job to earn enough to leave in maybe half a year”
“Ambitious,” Rex replied, stuck his hands in his pockets and turned away.
“Well, what future do I have on Tatooine? I don’t want to run a moisture farm and the biggest piloting outlet is the Boonta Eve Classic. I mean don’t get me wrong, it sure is a historic festival speaking for my family and podracing’s super fun, but you know…it’s not…what I really want”
“Yeah that is understandable,” Ahsoka agreed, her eyes downcast onto the metal floor. There was a pause, only the machines to be heard.
“You said podracing, have you ever flown a podrace?” Rex said suddenly, turning his eyes back to Luke.
“Of course! Like I said, it’s super fun, sure, a bit on the dangerous side if you don’t take care, but really, it’s fine”
Ahsoka’s eyes narrowed him down: “Seems like all the adults in your life don’t want you to podrace or touch a flying object actually” The words got a laugh out of him.
“Yeah pretty much,” he admitted. “Although, my aunt and uncle are pretty okay with whatever, Tatooinians are quite relaxed with some things coreside people aren’t. My neighbour though, Ben's his name, he doesn’t allow me to even sit in his speeder. He thinks I’ll make it explode in the first five minutes,” which earns him a laugh from Ahsoka and Rex.
You sure fly like that’d happen, Rex tried to convey in a look to Ahsoka.
“He always says,” whereupon Luke imitated a very classicold-man-voice, “Luke Skywalker, despite your family name, you guys can’t fly for shit, please keep it to the ground, as if he is the big flying whiz!”
He didn’t receive the laugh he expected from the passengers. Did he hit a nerve? He doesn’t think he hit a nerve. Mentally replaying the last ten seconds, he was nearly occupied enough to miss Ahsoka’s late smile. Nearly, not entirely.
She looked expectantly to Rex, who, by the looks of it, nonverbally refused, until he accepted. He cleared his throat.
“Right, uh, sorry kid, we knew a…person once with your last name, threw us off I guess”
“Ah,” Luke swung a hand through the air, “don’t worry, the name’s common, ‘specially in Outer Rim Territories” Ahsoka snorted, looking unconvinced.
“Well let’s hope,” Rex whispered to no one in particular, although Ahsoka looked understanding.
And yet, with the way you’re flying kiddo, I’d recommend a paternity test, she tried to tell him.
Silence once again claimed the room and didn’t let it out of its grasp until touch down.
Landing in the Chott Salt Flats just next to the Lars’ Homestead was, Luke presumed, pretty safe. He didn’t know it precisely either, but the ground did look solid enough. At least the landing didn’t spew up tons of sand, Luke would hate to be reprimanded for getting unnecessary sand into the vaporators. With a jolt going through all of their bones, he set down the ship and turned off the engines with the turn of the keys.
“Home Sweet Home,” he called out excitedly as he peeled himself out of his little cockpit. His passengers looked much happier than ten minutes ago and also way too happy to be seeing sand for the foreseeable future. Luke jumped out of the ship first, telling R1 to stay on the ship. A black painted droid that wasn’t even his with open wiring and a desert planet didn’t mix too well in his mind.
“Welcome to the Lars’ Homestead!”, he called out to Ahsoka and Rex who only now turned to see the full property.
“Wait here,” he ordered them, then walked through the door, scraped the sand off his boots (yes, he lived on a sand planet, that doesn’t mean he has to have the stuff in his bed) and called to into the house to Beru that he would only transport two passengers before ending his shift. As he came out of the building, he called to Ahsoka and Rex again: “Come on, the speeder’s this way!” They followed him.
The thirty-minute ride was spent in silence, although you couldn’t hear anything anyways over the wind blowing in their faces.
Ben’s old second-hand hut stood a little more hidden, partly emerged in a cliff, nearly invisible if you didn’t search for it.
Force forbid, uncle Owen would be furious if he’d knew Luke was just about to randomly knock on Kenobi’s door. It’s for your own good, Owen had always said, yet Luke was (and still is) quite a curious child. Sunken into his thoughts, he jumped out of the speeder last and locked it. Great, now the three of them were all standing in the midday’s heat like some idiots.
Rex was the first one to find his voice again: “Right, so… are we supposed to knock,” he looked to Luke as if to ask for help.
“Nah,” he rebuked and held his hands up in a defensive stance, one hand clasping the keys, “that’s your interpersonal relationship you guys have got to work through” Ahsoka chuckled.
“Come on, Rex”, she grabbed his hand and off they were towards the door, while Luke kept standing at the speeder. He wasn’t sure if this was the end of his job, but in all honestly – and he always tried to be honest with himself – he wanted to find out if Ben remembered them…or him for that matter. Luke had grown and changed a lot over the past six or seven years they hadn’t seen each other, but surely Ben would recognise him, would he not? Luke didn’t have the time to dwell on that, because the door opened and Ben Kenobi’s eyes, usually so dull and resigned started to glow as he recognised the passengers. First whispered words exchanged, then shaking, wrinkled fingers on damp cheeks, then grimaces folding into sobs laid into the fabric of each other’s tunics. Great, now he felt like an intruding voyeur.
It was only after the three had picked themselves up from the other’s bodies, that the attention shifted to Luke. An open outstretched hand from Ben gestured him to come forward. Finally in hearing range, the old hermit spoke to him: “Hello Luke, long time no see I guess”
“Yeah, I guess so…” Force have mercy, why was meeting distant family members always so fucking awkward?
“He brought us here,” Ahsoka exclaimed proudly, sending a shiver through Luke’s spine although it was nearly fifty degrees outside.
“What? How?” Kenobi seemed shocked, then warped his face into the look of disappointment that made everyone regret their last actions. Luke shrunk a bit into himself, before Rex was nice enough to redirect the conversation.
“Tell us the truth, General Kenobi-“
“Please Rex, the title is a bit outdated don’t you think?”
“Is that Skywalker’s?”, his index finger pointing exasperatedly at Luke while Ben sighed in reaction, pinched his nose bridge with three fingers. For Rex, that was answer enough.
“I guess I have some explaining to do,” a loud sigh was woven through the words spoken and a slight melancholy held hands with the implications left unspoken. Luke didn’t know what to do with it, so he agreed with Ahsoka and Rex who had agreed loudly.
“Well then,” Ben prompted, “I should make a pot of tea, huh?” A weak smile crept on his smile as the four made their way inside, a hand in Luke’s hair.
Finally, he thought, the sun was becoming unbearable in these noon hours.
He made himself a note to bring back the ship and to clock out later.