After about fifteen minutes of nauseating movement, we jerk to a stop.  I hit my head again and rub it gently.

"Hand down," a stormtrooper orders.

I follow his command, slowly.  He puts his blaster back down.

Gaspard chuckles.

"Let me guess, I'll get used to that, too?"

He nods, still laughing.  I sigh and wait for the door to open.

Beyond the door is a vast expanse of sand, piled into huge dunes that drift about with the wind.  My hair flies around, getting caught in the stubble—a side effect of the imprisonment—that peppers my chin.  I push it out of the way and squint against the wind.

Gaspard shoves my shovel into my hand. "Let's go, kid."

"I'm no kid," I protest, following him.

We all march out in a loose group, flanked by stormtroopers, as the tank rolls off back to the prison. Apparently, we're supposed to go around to the back of the dunes and work at digging out a mine that collapsed. Though why they couldn't just take us around to the back is beyond me.

I'm already parched halfway around the mountainous dune.

"Have you got any water?" I ask Gaspard quietly.

He shakes his head. "There's some in the mine. Just don't pass out."

"I'll try not to," I say, and clear my throat.  The dust isn't helping my already intense thirst.

"Do you have any of the handkerchiefs with you?" Gaspard stumbles and regains his balance, as though he'd never tripped in the first place.

I nod.  "I brought all of them."

"Tie one of them around your face, like this," he removes one from his pocket and folds it over, tying the ends behind his head so it covers his nose and mouth, leaving only the top of his head and his eyes exposed.

I follow his lead, fumbling until it kind of stays up, but I have to retie it every few steps, or else it falls off into the sand.

Gaspard walks behind me, tying it tightly as we march along, never breaking stride.

"Thank you," I say when he's back next to me.

"No problem, Cassian."  I can't see his mouth, but his eyes are smiling.

I smile back.

Somehow, I survive the rest of the way to the mine.  It definitely helps that most of the walk around is in the shade.  Although that does mean the walk back won't be.

There's a tin cup next to a pump.

"Can I drink that?" I ask Gaspard quietly.

"Yes.  After they assign us jobs."

Everyone starts to line up, and I follow their lead.  I'm suddenly reminded of the ceremonious picking of the teams before any games could begin, back shortly after Lac and Theron died, when I was doing my best at being a model citizen.

A stormtrooper points to Gaspard, myself, and four other prisoners.  "You six on digging in the east wing."

I almost laugh at the fact that it's called a "wing" as though we were workers in some grand house on Coruscant.

Gaspard leads me over to the pump and lets me drink first.  It takes four cups before my throat is no longer dry, but then my stomach hurts.  He laughs at me.  "You take a sip, then swish it around for a few seconds, then take another sip."  He demonstrates.  "See?  And once you've wetted your whistle, you can drink one more.  No stomach ache."

"You might have told me that earlier."

He picks up his shovel and hands me mine.  "We learn from our mistakes.  Let's go."

We work to excavate a tunnel until a stormtrooper walks around and hands us small tins, which we are allowed to sit down and eat quickly.  There's a stack of nutrient cubes inside, as well as a canteen of water.  I down the tasteless cubes with a bit of water each, then swish the remaining water around like Gaspard showed me.

On the way back to where the tank dropped us off, we go around the other side, avoiding the evening sun to walk in the shade.  I'm grateful.

I decide, during our walk, that tomorrow I'll make sure to drink more water at breakfast.

I fall into a routine, drink this much water at breakfast, drink this much once we get there, drink all of the water at lunch, drink this much before we leave, quench my thirst back at the prison.

On my eighth night, Gaspard and I, and the rest of the prisoners, walk back to our own respective cells.  Before I go into mine, he calls out, "May you go to sleep with dreams and awake with plans."

"What's that from?"

"My mother told me that when I was a child on Dantooine."  He pauses, making sure that nobody will bowl into him, like the Mon Calamari did my first day.

"Well, thanks.  And you, too.  Go to sleep with dreams and wake up with plans."

He gives me a smile and a wink and rejoins the stream of tired prisoners.

I lay down on my bed and a few minutes later the door clicks locked.  The block fills with heavy breathing and snores, but I find myself thinking about what Gaspard said.

Was it just a Spur of the moment word of well wishing?  Or did he mean something? 

The hard work of the last week put me to sleep before I can figure it out.