Chapter Three (Patreon)

Sandstorm was the name Ali’ya settled on. It took a year and a half to write. The library was the only place she could use a datapad, and despite being allowed out of the house sometimes her time wasn’t all free. There were Togorian lessons from her great-grandmother, early martial arts lessons from the Cathar couple across the street (Aliya traded half the fresh fruit she’d gotten for her birthday for the lessons), as well as all the reading she wanted to do. The fiction was appalling, but the same couldn’t be said for the non-fiction. Regardless of how dry and boring the writing was, the topics were still novel and fascinating to her. Use whatever language you want, spaceflight and hyperspace would still be interesting, to say nothing of the various history books of the galaxy. Whenever she couldn’t find the right words to write, Ali’ya grabbed the nearest book. Sometimes she had to look up half the words, especially if it was about engineering. Apparently her Technology Adept trait didn’t apply to the engineering aspects, though her Learning Prodigy trait did. Once she could read the entire sentence, the concepts stuck in her mind. They were even easier to put together! One day she was reading about how supercompressed oil could be used for droid hydraulics and--once she’d looked up enough words that she decided to just bring the dictionary over as well--she was able to connect it to a book she’d read about the unique properties of Queseyan Oil, which could remain in a liquid state at pressures of up to 55,000 atm.

Eventually, the book was ready. Sandstorm was the first in a series, a book about a young slave from Tatooine who managed to escape his master after cutting off his own arm. Wandering the desert, he had a spiritual journey where he realized that the true enemy was not the Tuskens, nor the Bounty Hunters or the Jawas or the other slaves who worked for the Masters, but the Masters themselves. He bonded with a greater Krayt Dragon after finding her wounded and patching her up, and by the end of the book had sworn that he would see the planet free.

Ordinarily, Ali’ya could have sold the book to a publisher. But she didn’t want to charge dozens of credits for each book--that would make it too expensive for the people who needed the escape most. She also didn’t want them removing the parts of it where the protagonist blamed the Republic for failing to act. So instead she planned to sell holocopies for a credit each. It wasn’t nothing, not this far down the stacks of Coruscant, but it was cheaper than any other form of entertainment. Even a shot at the bar cost more, something Ali’ya learned after hearing her uncle berate their cousin for drinking too much.

The problem was, holonet websites weren’t cheap. They were expensive, especially if you wanted them accessible from anywhere in the galaxy. 5,000 credits expensive.

But what Ali’ya wanted, Ali’ya got. She started selling holocopies of her book by the bar, taking a single credit and downloading them from her datapad (‘given’ to her by the librarian, who claimed it was damaged beyond used for the library even though the only problem was a crack in the casing). She was pretty sure the customers just though she was cute, but she’d take what she could get. The next place she tried was by another bar. This one was further away and a half-dozen levels up, but it was frequented by bounty hunters. They at least had credits to spend and there were enough Mandalorians among them that Ali’ya didn’t feel scared. Mandalorian’s love and protection of children was something that carried over from canon or fandom. Which Ali’ya wasn’t sure, but she was damned grateful regardless.

The hard part was keeping her credits. Not because people tried to steal them (they did, but Ali’ya was skilled enough with the Force to hide in the shadows, something she’d practiced ever since she realized it was a possibility) but because those credits could be used now. They could help her family. Her father, who was growing thinner and thinner after Ebor cut his pay. Her mother, who was exhausted and working herself to the bone. Her uncle, who had a terrible cough. Her grandmother, who was ill. Ali’ya did what she could with the Force when everyone was asleep, but it was hard. And medicine was expensive this far down. The free hospitals were all at the surface levels and travel there was tightly controlled, both by the Senate and the various local gangs. Though how one could call them local when even the smallest ruled over tens of millions Ali’ya didn’t know.

Ali’ya finally got the website running around her fifth birthday. That was the time when things started to change at home as well. Suddenly her father had money. She wasn’t sure how. Miss Hoa, the Cathar across the street who taught Ali’ya how to use her claws, said that Ebor had cut pay rates again after some new player managed to copy his datapad design. But her father was able to spend more time with them. Grandma and uncle had their medicine. Mother was able to cut her work hours. Their table was filled with food again, and not just the dry rations they’d had before. Fresh fruits and synthetic meat were now common occurrences. Ali’ya dined on the synth-nerf stake hungrily, all while profusely thanking her father.

Selling on the website was slow. She posted ads for it on every chat site she could find. They banned her pretty quickly, but she normally got a few credits out of it. The rest of her time was spent reading. Her father said he’d put her in school next semester, and Ali’ya wanted to make sure she was caught up on every subject, not just the ones she found interesting.

Her father was teaching her things now too. How to bathe their fur in sonic showers. How to use their claws to climb--and how fun it was, to climb up the side of Coruscant’s endless stacks.

“This is how your mother and I met,” he told her as they clawed their way up the levels. “She was from two levels below me. We always ran into each other on the walls.”

“Did you like her then?”

“Yes,” her father laughed. “Though I didn’t know it at the time. We competed for junk to salvage, you see. But eventually we figured out we were better as a team. She was great at pulling things apart, I was good at putting things together. That’s why Ebor hired me, back when he stilled valued his workers.”

“Do you think you could teach me?” Ali’ya asked.

“Of course, little one.”

“Now,” her father said, holding a soldering iron. “Where should I connect the mainframe to the elbow hydraulics?”

“Um, here?” Ali’ya guessed, pointing to a place on the droid.

“No,” her father answered. “We put it here. It’s not as direct, but this is a basic labor droid, so it doesn’t need to be fast. Do you know why?”

“Uh--so it doesn’t take up as much space?” Ali’ya asked. “Oh! No, because it’s cheaper! If you put it there you don’t need as much insulation cable, because the wires won’t be crossing!”

“Exactly,” her father smiled, ruffling her fur.

“Dad!”