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Time now for another installment in our mini-series of looks at the main trio of new characters from The Force Awakens! This time, we’re checking out the story about Rey from Before the Awakening, the novel (or collection of three novellas, really) by Greg Rucka.
Please note: You’re in spoiler territory, as I’ll be revealing the punchline of the Rey story here. Since the book was released on December 18, 2015, I’m figuring that more than three months is safe harbor.
First off, I gotta say, it’s very interesting that the first two stories in Before the Awakening have ended in “defeat” for our heroes. First, we got Finn’s failure on Pressy’s Tumble, where he was instructed to kill the miners but couldn’t do it – and that failure seen in close quarters by Captain Phasma. Next, we get Rey’s story of utter betrayal and despair. Quite honestly, if I’d been in her shoes, the events of this story would have broken me.
After a terrible sandstorm that last for days and leaves Rey starving and lightheaded, she makes the seeming mistake of going to Niima Outpost to trade for food, while everyone else has hightailed it out to the Graveyard of Giants, to see whether the storm has uncovered any new wrecks to salvage.
She heads out after getting her rations, late to the party, but from a high vantage point, spots a wreck far out that no one has seen before – and, in fact, is intact enough that it may be more valuable restored than stripped down.
Rey spends months secretly restoring the ship, but two other salvagers, Devi and Strunk, clue in and track her to the hidden wreck, and negotiate a cut of the proceeds in exchange for their help in repairing the ship. And it looks like the partnership is working – Devi and Strunk have their own secret salvage fields where they’re able to help Rey rebuild with parts she’d never have gotten otherwise. And that includes getting a working hyperdrive for the ship.
Early on, Devi asks where Rey plans to go with the ship, thinking that she must want to get offworld, and hopes Rey will take Devi and Strunk with her. But we know Rey wants to stay for her parents, so all she wants to do is trade for thousands of rations from Unkar Plutt.
When they finally fly the working ship to Niima Outpost, after working on it for the better part of a year, Rey walks out to get Unkar Plutt to see her prize, but Devi and Strunk, still on the ship, do exactly what they’d been hoping Rey would do herself – take off into the wild blue yonder with it.
And yet, Rey is somehow, not angry at them for the theft of the ship! How?! The book suggests that it was because they wanted to leave and Rey never even considered that possibility. But still, they essentially stole thousands of rations and months of work from her. I would have absolutely lost my mind over that.
Unlike the Finn story, we don’t have an idea of how long before The Force Awakens the Rey story happens. However, it does seem like it had to have happened in the last 2-3 years prior, because of the skills she’s developed and the shelter she’s maintained. We also learn about her flying skills, that she spent a rather long time getting a flight simulation program to work for her, and that she’s flown many types of vehicles in all kinds of conditions and in all kinds of crisis scenarios. The training pays off with her smooth flight of the salvaged freighter from the crash site to Niima Outpost, just before the ultimate betrayal. You could see it coming in the story, and I was desperately hoping it wouldn’t happen, yet still waiting for the other shoe to drop with Devi and Strunk. Wouldn’t it be poetic for them to cross paths with Rey again some day…
Trivia Time!
Test your knowledge of the Star Wars universe!Yesterday’s answer: F-11D blaster rifle
Today’s question: What kind of doll does Rey have in her home on Jakku?