Personal Journal entry 1:

Bright suns to whomever may be reading this! It’s another especially bright, and hot day here in Galma, my wife Danielle finally convinced me to sit down and actually start this whole journal entry thing. Not sure where this will end up one day, for all I know Dok will have it archived somewhere in his collection long after I’m gone. I suppose I should back up just a bit, give you some context as to who exactly is writing this.

My name’s Joshua and I’ve pretty much been stuck here on Batuu for all my life. Now, don’t get me wrong, this place has a certain beauty to it, it’s just hard to stay here when the whole galaxy is just waiting to be explored. My parents grew up on Corellia, but decided the life of living in slums and getting addicted to spice was not the best fit to raise children, so they came to this little planet called Batuu. My sister and I would drive our mother crazy running all over the sandy deserts of Galma, getting into trouble, while my dad made shipping runs for Dok Ondar. Dok’s an old collector of fine antiquities and pays handsomely for rare objects he sees as valuable.

But, as with most things in life, everything always changes. I started getting into the Podracing scene here, and started getting pretty good at it when I had just turned twenty. During this time, my mechanic, a Naboo native, had recently paid off a debt and decided to sweep my sister off her feet. Both literally and figuratively, as they decided to head off planet back to his home of Naboo. Not only did they move, but my parents were intrigued by the peaceful nature of the planet, since my dad had just finished up a couple of rough missions, and was looking to get out of the shipping business.

So, just like that, I was alone.

It wasn’t all bad, the folks from Galma here on Batuu are a very kind community, even if they do have a few shady tendencies. My father also left me his ship, albeit with some definite work to be done, a Corellian YT-2400 Star Freighter. Similar in look to the YT-1300 series, but a lot roomier for my liking. Dad got it from an old friend, I think his name was Dash or something like that. I had a community here in Galma, a Podracer, and a ship; only catch is that I’m a pilot not an engineer.

Enter, my Danielle.

I did what most of us pilots would do and decided to head into Black Spire Outpost and talk to Salju, one of the nicest gals in a hive of scoundrels. I asked her if any of her contract mechanics and engineers she could recommend, being that Podracing seemed to be the easiest and quickest ways to make credits to eventually get off-planet. And as the fates would have it, she pointed me in the direction of Danielle, a Batuuan born native herself with a custom pilot/navigational bi-pedal droid named LX-922, or “Lex” for short. We hit it off immediately, Lex took a little bit longer, but eventually I won her over too. The pilot and the engineer got together and we decided to get married.

We had a good thing going. I was placing higher and higher on the leaderboards at the local races. I fly a KT9 Wasp, a podracer from Voltec’s repulsorcraft line, heavily modified by Danielle of course. The thing you need to know about Batuu, is that you have to be careful with who you make deals with. While playing a game of Sabacc at the cantina, I guess I couldn’t handle my Wampa ale and decided to boast about my piloting skills. Oga Garra took note of that and decided that I was going to be her main bet in the next big race, making sure that I’d better not let her down. Oga is the unofficial kingpin of Black Spire, she knows everything and everyone, almost every local working in the outpost is in debt to her.

Luckily, I wasn’t too worried about the race, it should have been an easy win. I should have paid more attention. What I didn’t realize is that in my loud boasting, I had angered some other racers in the cantina. The day of the race came and we were all set, my dark orange Wasp was humming from its’ twin engines, while a bit of sabotage had gone underway. I can’t prove it, and Oga sure didn’t believe me, but my left engine coupler had been severed. Something like that would have been noticed by Danielle or Lex, so it must have happened as we were preparing in the lineup. I was able to start off pretty well, but when you’re moving close to 700 kilometers per hour, a severed coupler won’t last long. I crashed, and I crashed hard. The left engine shot off and slammed against a spire while I spun off in the opposite direction.

Just like that, I knew that Oga was not going to be happy.

To be fair it could have been a lot worse. I could have died, but I was able to walk away and salvage most of the pod. I was more afraid of the conversation with Oga, I had just lost her a lot of credits and no real quick way of getting them back. The conversation was vey short, I sat in her office as she barked at me in Huttese, then translated by a protocol droid; wherein she explained that there was an opening with Jat Ka’s Coolers and Bubo’s milk stand. I was to do whatever the two of them needed, and all my credits would deposit back to her.

That brings us to now.

Every day, I wake up in our makeshift apartment in a cockpit of an old b-wing and get on the transport from Galma into Black Spire Outpost. It’s about an hour and a half trip in, so it’s a nice chance to hear the latest news and rumors. Danielle was able to stay out of Oga’s eyes, so while I’m at the outpost, she’s been able to work on our ticket off of Batuu. That YT-2400 Star Freighter, which Danielle has now nicknamed the Outrider, is the main focus to get up and running. I recently heard rumors of Resistance troops having a base in the ancient ruins near the forrest. They seem to have run into some major trouble, but of the travelers and stories I’ve heard, I think they’re fighting for something bigger. Freedom in the galaxy is something I wish there was more of and they seem to be igniting that spark. That was around a month ago, but the real danger now is the First Order, imperialist tyrants trying to control the galaxy, arrived two weeks ago in search of some spies. I’m amazed Oga has allowed them to be here for as long as they have, but I’m sure she has more in her plans than I know.

That pretty much catches us up to the now. My days consist of working in BSO surrounded by travelers and smugglers of all kinds, just waiting to pay off my debt and get off this rock. I still race my pod, I’m just a bit more careful of what I say and how much I enjoy myself in the cantina. I’ll be sure to keep this journal updated, especially with some of the high tensions in the outpost, and one day, journaling our adventures in this galaxy.

And with that, I will sign off,

‘Till the spires!