"People don't like it when you have something they don't." She nods.

"Exactly. Once you're more established - and off Jakku - you'll be able to change that. People don't like a rival, but they love a hero."

Rey hups up and continues pulling her sled. "I've never seen a hero before. Were you a hero?"

"For a while, at first. I enjoyed it."

"What sort of stuff did you do?"

"Shortly after I started training, I helped rescue a planet from a droid army..." she starts, launching into a series of tales of her - more heroic - deeds, mostly prior to the outbreak of the Clone Wars. Her stories also paint a picture of a vastly different galaxy than the planet Rey lives on.

Rey listens and asks more questions and takes many rests. They're a pretty long way from any sort of civilization, though eventually nearing when the sun is going down they make their way to her hiding place. It's a half-buried AT-AT that Rey has started to haul sand out of.

"Think I'm gonna sleep now. Will you stay?"

"I will. I promise."

It's a weird feeling, believing her. She's never really had reason to give that sort of trust before. Her mama was always out, working, and she has always been alone.

"I can't wait to show you Niima. There's so much stuff and people and the blobfish is kinda mean but he can be nice sometimes, I swear."

"I'm looking forward to it. Though I think you said you were going to sleep?"

Rey grumbles playfully but does settle down, covering herself with an old - something - to keep her warm in the chilly desert air.

And Anakin keeps watch over her through the night.

(She - can't believe she's found someone who can see her, it's been - years, possibly the last time Luke ever saw her fully, enough to talk, was after the New Republic formed, before Ben was born - she'd been so proud of her children, so proud of what they were going to build - Luke's glimpsed her since, probably knows she's watching over them still - )

(It's been seventeen years since she's had a conversation.)

(Anakin gets lonely. Even if she wasn't the sort to keep her promises... She's not leaving this kid.)

(And, who knows. Maybe it's time she took a student, for real. She doesn't know if she'll be any good at it... But it's worth trying. Worth not leaving a child to waste away in the desert.)

Anakin's there when Rey wakes, meditating. She's calmer than she had been, settled somehow.

She so pretty and nice and she stayed all night.

"What are you doing?" she whispers. It seems like a whispering time.

"Meditating," she says, softly, as she surfaces. "It's a way of - learning my own mind, and getting to know the Force."

Rey goes and sits next to her. "Will you show me?"

"I can, yeah, though there's a lot of ways to meditate."

She starts walking Rey through the absolute basics of meditation - mostly posture, breath control, that sort of thing.

She can follow directions and sit up straight and cross her legs and breath in the weird way that Anakin tells her to.

It's relaxing, as promised. Makes her thoughts that aren't the steady count of breaths seem less prominent, less overwhelmingly important.

And then Anakin starts talking about the Force, about how it's in her heart, in the air she's breathing, in Rey and in Anakin and in the sand -

It's easier to tell, like this. There's something in Rey responding to her measured breaths.

It's so weird. But familiar, like an old friend that is always at your side.

- except the pain in her stomach is stronger now and she feels weak. She's still so hungry.

Anakin brings them out of meditation. "You're going to need food," she says, softly. "How do you usually get things to eat?"

"I give the Blobfish the stuff I find and he gives me ration packs."

"Well, we have some valuable things now. You might want to hold some of it back for your own use, or in case of an emergency - but I know what fair prices for these pieces should be."

"I dunno if fair is important to him."

"It should be - at the very least, if he's smart he'll give more for things that're hard to get and high value to him." Also if Anakin can heal someone despite being a ghost maybe she can mind trick someone into not being a dick.

Rey isn't so sure, but she nods anyway, then starts sorting through her sled and hiding away the things theyre going to sell and the parts she's going to hide. It takes her a little while, digging is hard, but she manages. Eventually she stands.

"I'm ready now!"