My highschool adventure as a Sith is wrong, as expected (1.5) (Patreon)

Trama is something that is purely subjective. What could traumatize person A could leave person B completely unaffected -- there was no person in this galaxy that had the same exact values, fears, expectations, and desires. Despite the population, no matter their species, they tend to follow the flow like sheep, everyone was unique in their own way. The reaction to trauma, and what caused trama, was one of those things that made each person distinct. 

Self-awareness is one of my very few redeeming features, so I knew I was a perfect example of this. The rejection of Kaori Orimoto affected me more than it should have because of my social expectations. Or, perhaps it would be truer to say that her rejection was traumatizing because I read into social interactions, and hoped that despite a lifetime of being a social outcast, I could have a youthful normy highschool life. 

Had anyone else been rejected by her, it would forever be a moment that would make you cringe and die a little inside, but it wouldn’t leave a permanent mark on someone’s personality. 

In that same vein, not everyone was traumatized by slavery in the same way. There were some that found pride in the fact that they were now a possession. There were some that treated it as a job that you couldn’t quit. Others couldn’t bear the thought of a leash on their neck, no matter how loose, and would happily tear their own throat out if it meant freedom. Then, there were those that weren’t traumatized at all. I was apart of the latter group. 

“Good morning, Mrs. Jeen-Lie,” I greeted with a small bow, keeping myself calm. Every muscle was so taunt that they could snap from the strain, ready to flee at the drop of a hat. My face was blank, my poker face was flawless after years of living on this planet, but judging by the small smile on her face, Jeen-Lie seemed to see right through me. 

“Quite the reaction to seeing your former master. Especially after you escaped from me,” she noted, cocking her head as her smile grew. “But, you always were an odd one, Hikigaya. Always so smart, so gifted...I don’t suppose you’re here to return to me?” She asked, sounding more amused by my sudden appearance than anything. 

“I have not,” I answered with a sense of finality. I would be no one’s slave ever again. A man could survive a month without food, three days without water, but not a single second without pride. That pride could be found in many things, but for me, it was not being an object to be owned. 

Jeen-Lie nodded, apparently expecting that answer. The tension eased ever so slightly when she didn’t seem displeased with my response. If anything, she seemed more amused than anything, and that was enough to start raising red flags. “I see. It seems that the Force has seen fit to bring us together again -- if you aren’t here to sell yourself back into slavery, then why are you here.”

I suppose she was right about that. Out of anyone I could have run into, it had to be my former master who ran a shop that repaired and sold droids. More importantly, astrodroids. 

“I would like an astrodroid. Please,” I added, giving her a small bow, carefully watching her reaction. Again, she was more amused than anything. Something wasn’t adding up. One of her escaped slaves shows up on her doorstep unannounced, and she’s amused? Jeen-Lie was hardly the harshest of masters, but if there was ever a time for her to break out the whip, it would be now. 

“And what would an escaped slave need with an astrodroid?” She asked, her tone was teasing. “It sounds like you’ve found some very interesting work on the basement,” she observed, using the slang term for the actual planet of Cadinth. 

Naturally, I lied when I answered. Jeen-Lie was pleasant right now, but I doubt that she was so amused by my antics that she wouldn’t sell me out to the Empire when I answered her question. “I work as a mechanic, and someone has a homemade ship that needs an OS to navigate hyperspace lanes,” in my considerable experience lying to get what I want, I found using a version of the truth worked best. 

Jeen-Lie’s plucked eyebrows rose at that, “oh?” She questioned, gesturing me to continue. 

“And I was promised a trip on the ship if I could get an astrodroid that could do it,” I explained, giving a plausible explanation. Jeen-Lie gave a small nod, apparently buying that. 

“You won’t be able to take off until they catch that Jedi,” she commented. “You’ll be shot down before you leave orbit.” That made my eyes narrowed in suspicion. 

“The Empire has blockaded the planet?” I questioned, my lips pressing into a small frown. That could prove to be a problem. If they flat out blockaded the planet with a fleet, then getting out noticed got a lot more difficult. Jeen-Lie confirmed my suspicion with a now, making my frown deepen. 

“Though,” she began, “I suspect that isn’t likely to stop you from leaving. A bomb in your neck didn’t stop you from leaving me.” She commented, gesturing me to follow her. She turned her back to me, expecting me to obey and, for a moment, I considered running away. Only the knowledge that it would be pointless stopped me from breaking out into a sprint in any direction that would take me away from here. 

So, I followed her like I did so many times before. I heard her chuckling, earning a dull look from me as she spoke without looking at me. “I was very shocked at your sudden departure, Hikigaya. At first, I assumed you had been stolen from me by a rival,” she explained. 

I decided to play the long con when it came to escaping slavery. I obeyed every order, I went above and beyond, and her trust in me grew until the point she trusted me enough to work on droids. In doing so, she gave me all the parts I needed to organize my escape. 

“You built a zapper to short circuited the explosive in your neck. I never expected that from anyone, much less a small human,” she said, her tone casual as we walked the still familiar path to her store. The floor was built almost identical to a shopping mall, only each store was much bigger. There were food markets, mechanic shops, weapons and anything else you could think of. And each store owner dreamed of the day they were successful enough that they could move up a floor. “I was furious for a time. You did rather good work for someone so young, and you are a quick learner…”

The force wasn’t warning me of danger when she said that, even if every instinct was telling me to turn tail and run. I crushed those instincts, the blaster on my belt felt like it was made of lead. I desperately hoped that I wouldn’t have to use it. 

“Too quick, perhaps,” she continued, approaching her shop. It looked exactly the same as the last time I saw it. Droids stood motionless behind a glass panel, and behind it revealed a store filled to the absolute brim with parts and machines. Stepping inside, I was greeted with the smell of metal and grease -- looking around, I started to do the math of just how much all of this was worth down below before quickly giving up the endeavor. 

I could live like a king down below with all of these parts. People would kill for what laid on a shelf, completely unprotected. 

“You said you need an astrodroid, correct?” Jeen-Lie said, bring my attention back to her as she stepped behind a counter. A droid...that I built remained behind the counter. SD-V1, or Service Droid Version 1. It stood behind the counter, rattling off greetings and advertisements, its protocols weren’t developed enough to do more. 

I turned my gaze back to Jeen-Lie, bracing myself for what was to come. “I did,” I answered as she leaned against the counter with her underarms while her upper arms were crossed over her modest chest. Her fingers tapped on the counter, her poker face every bit as good as mine. 

“Well, it so happens that I have an astrodroid available. Probably the only one on this floor,” she said, telling me a bald-faced lie. It was a common tactic to drive up the price. And considering that I didn’t have anywhere near enough credits for a droid, I could guess what she was about to ask for in exchange. 

Even still, I asked, “what do you want for it?” 

Jeen-Lie smiled at me, a smile I saw more times than I cared to count back when I was enslaved by her. It was the same smile she gave me when I was a child in the slave pens on a lower floor, packed with a dozen other children with so little room I could barely stand. 

“Nothing,” Jeen-Lie lied, placing one of her lower arms on her hip. She let out a laugh when she saw the disbelieving look that I didn’t bother to hide. “Always a suspicious one. Fine, you can have the droid if you do two things…” She amended after she was done laughing at my expense. “The droid itself needs some repairs and your replacement keeps complaining that he doesn’t have the parts.”

That sounded far more like the Jeen-Lie that I knew. “And the second thing?” I asked, wanting to know what I’m getting into. However, her smile just grew a fraction before it disappeared entirely. 

“When you’re done, I want you to answer a question for me. If I like your answer, I’ll give you the droid that you fix,” Jeen-Lie said, her tone carefully even. Even still, I knew she was telling the truth. There were reasons why I was one of the few that remained relatively untraumatized by my time as a slave and a big part of that was who my master was- who Jeen-Lie is. 

“And you’ll let me go?” I questioned, wanting to make sure.

“And I’ll let you go,” Jeen-Lie agreed with a nod. I searched her face for any trace of deception but found none. It seemed too good to be true, and things too good to be true rarely were. However, despite my scrutiny, she pushed herself off the counter and gestured to the workroom, a place I spent nearly a year in. 

I hesitated to follow her into it when she opened the door. A hand went down to the blaster at my waist, finding only more dread when I felt its heavy weight. Swallowing thickly, I stepped behind the counter and followed her into the backroom, seeing the familiar room. A workbench covered in parts, the shell of a droid on top, with more shelves filled to the absolute brim with parts. It was like I stepped into a bank vault. 

What I didn’t see was a trap. It seemed if she was planning to betray me, then she wasn’t going to do it before the droid was fixed. She lead me to a small droid, it’s head was a wide rectangle with two eye lenses, one slightly bigger than the other. Its chassis was small, just big enough to fit in a data port, powerpack, and other odds and ends. Its legs were backward while its feet were clamps lined with tractor locks. 

“This isn't an astrodroid,” I pointed out, an accusation not so subtly hidden in my tone. Jeen-Lie nodded before explaining. 

“You just need the OS to plot out hyperspeed courses, right? Then that little guy is all you need -- his processors can handle hyperspeed corrections, so just hook it up to the ship. Real astrodroids are more for processing variables during a spacebattle.”

Oh. 

“Who shot it?” I asked, gesturing to the hole punched through the chassis. Already I started to poke into its insides, seeing the fried wires, what was left of the power converter and compensator. The hydraulics were shot to- as in they were worn down, not actually shot. 

“Does it matter? Can you fix it?” Jeen-Lie asked, making me think about the question. I...huh...I see what this is. This is an Event where my previous experience breaking down scrap for several years comes into play. Cautiously, I looked around the room, feeling the Force nudging me in some directions, to different parts as if to answer the question for me. 

I nodded, “I can. Just give me a couple of minutes,” I told her, spotting a stepping stool that I used before to see over the counter. Jeen-Lie took a step back and let me work. It didn’t take long to gather everything up, and even less time to take the pieces apart. I had tools now. A luxury that took me six months to earn back on the basement. 

It was...I had never cared about wealth before. In my last life, I came from a decently well off family. Komichi and I received pocket money in place of affection or parental guidance, we never had to worry about groceries or anything. Now...I once spent twelve hours digging through the sane with my bare hands to get to a part that turned out to be worthless. 

Seeing this now, in a way, I had taken it for granted. And that galled at me. Not that I had taken it for granted, but the fact that I could look at my time of being a slave and feel regretful that I hadn’t appreciated it enough. 

Minutes ticked by in a heavy silence as I broke parts down to build new ones. The hydraulics were cleaned, the power converter was replaced, as was the powerpack. The compensator was salvaged, jury-rigged with a half dozen. Then all that was left was slapping on a metal panel after making sure that nothing else had suffered any heat damage. 

*Beeeeeep?* The droid asked, booting up. The protocols and memory storage cards were stored in its head, so it should be fine. It stood up, the lenses swirled, zooming in and refocusing on my face before looking around. It flinched back when it’s gaze landed on the corpses of other droids in various states of repair, *Beep! Beep-be-be-beep?!*

“You’re not being scrapped,” I told it, understanding binary. It seemed like it wasn’t programmed to use basic, but I guess it didn’t matter. I understood binary. 

The droid swiveled around to look at me, its small legs testing its new wait, going through system checks. Then it cocked its head, *boo-beep?* I simply nodded, ignoring its happy chirps as it hopped around a little to turn to Jeen-Lie. She watched me, her gaze drifting away from the droid that was doing a dance to settle heavily on me. 

“What’s your question?” I asked, hoping that this would be the end of it. Jeen-Lie let out a small sigh as she crossed her two sets of arms. 

“Do you believe in destiny-”

“No,” I interjected. “Destiny, fate...they’re rationalizations of events that have happened and justifications to force those ‘destined’ to act a certain way. A fated meeting is just coincidence or bad timing, a destined one is given a mold to grow into and they’re nudged into it, even if they have to shave off a limb to make them fit.” I explained, looking away as I doubled checked the droids readings. 

“Hm. When you talk like that, you really don’t sound like a kid, Hikigaya. More like a bitter old man,” Jeen-Lie commented, sounding like she accepted my answer. 

“Age means little when it comes to experience,” I retorted, satisfied with my work. 

“I’m asking,” Jeen-Lie continued like I hadn’t said anything, which was the norm in my experience. “Because I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately. ‘The Force works in mysterious ways’ ‘Trust in the Force’ and so on and so on. I was thinking about you, actually.” She said in a tone that could only be described as wistful. 

“I wasn’t looking to buy a slave when I went down to the slave pens,” she informed, earning a blink of surprise from me. “I was taking a shortcut to meet up with some friends at the time...the point is, I stumbled across you in that pen. Even back then, you had that rotten look in your eyes.” She teased with more than a little amusement. “I don’t know why I bought you. It was...like an impulse.”

Or, for those that were genre-savvy like I was, plot contrivance. 

“And you turn out perfect for my shop. A quick learner, handy with tools and now you just fixed a droid that’s been on that table for a week because I was waiting to get my hands on a proper part,” she explained, looking at me with an expression I couldn’t quite describe. Like I was a problem she didn’t know the answer to. “Doesn’t that seem odd to you? And now when you’re trying to leave this planet, we run across each other and I have the one thing that you need to get off this dustball?”

It did sound odd to me, but, in the end, I stood by my beliefs. After all, if a few coincidences were all it took to change my mind, then they were hardly beliefs in the first place. “Coincidence. Chance. If you didn’t have to meet up with your friends, then we would have never met and if you weren’t heading to the upper floors when I came to this one, then we would have never come across each other again. Just because someone searches for meaning in a chance encounter doesn’t mean there is any.”

I had to believe that. If there was no fate if there was no higher narrative that I was plucked from my world to serve. If there was no narrative, then that meant I could find my way out of it. It meant that I could go home to my sister, and go to high school and get a mediocre job since I doubt I would ever find a woman to marry me so I could fulfill my ambition of becoming a house husband. 

“You’re going to be a force of nature when you’re an adult, you know that?” Jeen-Lie commented, uncrossing her arms as a look of resigned acceptance appeared on her face. I scoffed at that -- with any luck, I would return to my loner ways. Perhaps become a hermit now that I have experience with it. “But, I’m a woman of my word. You are free.”

Free. Not until I get off this planet. 

“...thank you,” I responded after a moment, knowing that she meant more than being free to go. I was free. I wasn’t an escaped slave anymore. I turned to the droid, offering an arm for it to perch on. It beeped at me before hopping on, climbing onto my shoulder so it was just overlooking it. It would have to be hidden before I went back down, but for now, it was fine. 

With that, I started to leave the shop, only to pause when Jeen-Lie called out to me, “Hikigaya.” turning around, I saw that she was looking at me with eyes filled with profound sadness. “Was I really that terrible of a master?”

I looked away, “no. I was that terrible of a slave.”