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| - Hando Likir had no idea where he was. It had been days since he had battled the pirates at Tatooine, and had escaped into hyperspace. But the only problem was that he had crashed into the mass shadow of an asteroid, and was now drifting meaninglessly through empty space. He sighed. He turned in his chair and looked around. Everyone else was asleep, including Shia, the Twi’Lek smuggler, Ghai Fek, the Herglic gunner and co-pilot, Trisha, his girlfriend and technician, and Ghoel, the Wol Cabbasshite crook. He stared at Ghoel for a long time. He had met the Wol Cabbasshite over ten years back when he was working for that stinking and crazy Jabba the Hutt. Ghoel was hanging from the rafters, stealing Jabba’s food. After Jabba’s death, he had befriended the weird parasite, who could sense any incoming metallic objects and so warn for danger. Hando rubbed his hand over his glistening green skin. He did not find it hard to imagine being a Human, or a Bith, or a Rodian or most other species. But he could hardly imagine what it felt like being a Wol Cabbasshite like Ghoel. Ghoel had no legs or arms, and communicated using magnetic slag in his guts. Hando grimaced. He could never imagine being as weird looking as Ghoel, but he also considered it was probably just as hard for Ghoel to imagine being a Duros like himself. Ghoel was as still as a statue, fast asleep in the overhead locker. The rest of the crew was just as motionless, only their chests slowly rising and falling as they breathed the stale air in the cabin. That gave him a reminder: The life support. He had spent hours tinkering with the life support recharge, but it still wouldn’t run smoothly for more than a minute or two, and every time it broke down it took longer to repair. Brilliant. A slow and painful death from carbon dioxide poisoning for everybody except poor old Ghoel who could survive in a vacuum. He would have to wait, slowly watch his friends bodies decay until he eventually starved to death. Hando had witnessed the life support short circuit so many times. It always happened in exactly the same place, and every time it took longer to repair. He couldn’t figure out what the kriffing hell was wrong with it. He had spent hours and hours trying to restore the system. Perhaps he had spent days, he couldn’t tell. The on board clocks were destroyed and there were no planets and stars to determine the time. Every day he felt hotter and hotter, and more and more tired. For a short time he had considered ejecting himself into space and committing suicide, but he had quickly dismissed that idea. He rose from his seat at the head of the bridge of the Distant Horizons smuggling freighter and stretched his body listening to his vertebrae snap into place one by one. Then he relaxed and headed past his sleeping crewmates into the passageway. Like always, it was a mess. In theory he was a smuggler, and in theory he and his crew should stash things away hidden, but there was so much illegal contraband that there could never be room in the into the secret floor compartment which he was now walking over. In the hallway, all of the criminal stash was scattered all over the place, packed in crates and cardboard boxes. There were ornaments, jewellery, spice, guns, illegal hacker droids, everything. If anybody, whether they were from the alliance or from the empire, would take one look in here and have them all imprisoned. But now the mess didn’t matter. Wherever they were now, there were no imperials, or alliance forces, for hundreds of light years around. Slowly, Hando made his way past to the great mess to the floor panel above the life support recharge system. He stood still for a moment, then slowly bent down, stretched his arms out and lifted up the floorboard. He climbed down into the smuggler compartment, then opened a large hatch in the wall, and climbed through. “Blast it” he cursed. It was as he had feared. The life support was fried- again. He had seen this before. Every time he tried to repair the gas converter, it had exploded. Every time, the explosion had been bigger. Every time, the damage was worse, and it took longer it took for him to repair. And the longer it took for him to repair this kriffing wreck of a contraption, this abomination, the longer he and his friends had to go without air. He cursed again under his breath. Somehow, he was absolutely sure that this time too, the machine would blow, with an explosion even bigger and more destructive than the last. It was like being at school again. “Oh man” Hando groaned at the memory, almost jumping out of his skin from the sound of his own voice. School had never been Hando’s thing. Every time he achieved something, he was given something harder. Every time he survived something, he was given an even harsher experience. It was the same here. The more times he tried repairing the kriffing life support recharge, the bigger the explosion was when it short circuited again, and the more damage he had to repair the next time. “School, life support, school, life support, school, life support, school...” It went through his head, again and again, while he repaired the life support recharge. He had done it so many times before. He didn’t need to think. His hands worked automatically. His body was here, but none of his mind. His movement were automatic, repetitive, as if he were a droid, a load lifter, something like that, with his hands automatically making the same movements they were programmed to do. His mind was thinking back to school. Or at least, it was trying to. Hando was so tired he couldn’t think of anything. He longed for this ceaseless labour to end. He longed to land his ship back the stable ground, on the strong metal landing platform in the cool air of Bespin. He longed to head with Trisha into the luxury rooms, and enjoy the endless clouds, the view, the city... Hando was asleep. His body flopped backwards- and his head hit the hard metal floor. Hando jerked awake. His head was bleeding from the back. He rubbed the dark blue blood over the back of his head. Luckily, even though he was bald, his head was the same colour as his blood, so a grisly cut wouldn’t show. He lay back and grimaced. And he nearly fell asleep again, but then forced himself to keep awake. He rose, crept out of the hatchway and up through the floor. That, he decided, would be the last time he would fall asleep while down in that stinking hole. He went over to a random cardboard box, tore off the insulation tape, and rummaged inside. It contained spice. He looked at each packet, until he found some rafa’tatooine joints. He reached into his coat pocket and took out a flamelighter. Then he lit the paper joint and put it to his lips, and inhaled deeply. The effect was disappointing. Unlike most times, this cigarette hardly stimulated his mind at all. He felt s tiny tinge of energy and euphoria, but that was it. He took out the joint, took a step back and held it to the light, then took another smaller step back. His foot landed on a large metal spice roller. He slid, and fell backwards, tumbling through the open floor and into the hole. “Aaaaaaaarg dammit” he screeched. He thrashed wildly in the air with his feet, kicking a toolkit through the air. He groaned in agony, and ran his fingers down his back. He sat up and pushed himself towards the wall, then leaned against it. He rolled up his trousers. There were a few bruises, not to serious. But when he tried to get up his back was on fire with a sharp pain. And he staggered back and collapsed against the wall. Then he sat silent. Obviously nobody had heard his screams, since nobody seemed to be coming. He exhaled slowly and shifted, trying to ease the pain. His back touched something rough, and he pushed up on it with his arm and elbow. A loud beep went off. Hando sat still, listened. A quiet hum was coming from inside the ship, and he felt cool air rush past his forehead. No it couldn’t be... the life support. He smiled a tired smile, but then a cold shiver ran down his spine. The life support. The... “Oh no” he gasped and he frantically dragged himself to his feet. But it was too late. A huge explosion knocked him off his feet, and blasted bits of metal everywhere, sent showers of sparks flying and shook the ship. Without even turning to look, Hando clambered up through the floor. He was inconceivably furious. He punched his fist into a crate of guns and hurled it into the hole. He kicked and punched mindlessly, smashed crates and boxes, and screamed curses across the ship.
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