Imperial times- Coruscant

Tarik snuffled in his sleep, an uneasy feeling prickling at the back of his mind. He woke up with a start, senses on full alert.

The Drathan.

He�d felt him again, somewhere above, closer than usual. Mid-town. He snarled, curling his tail around himself defensively. His shoulder was healing, but his leg still throbbed from the bone-mending injection they�d given him. The break was healing, but it hurt, and he had no time to be in pain.

He grabbed his staff from the floor next to him, tensing as the door to the storage shed below opened, then closed again. The Gammorean that owned the storage facility he was hiding in lacked the simple intelligence to look up and worry about the little nest Tarik had built in the abandoned mezzanine level of the warehouse.

A wall of empty and discarded cargo crates hid his home from view. Tattered tarpaulins and frayed rope, woven over a frame of ceiling support beams made a tent-like cocoon around him, keeping the water from the cracked window from leaking in. This was the only place that hadn�t been discovered yet, everywhere else he�d lived had been found sooner or later.

The Gammorean seemed to think of Tarik as nothing more than an uninvited watch-Delrog, something that kept the thieves and vermin away. He even left food out for Tarik on occasion, especially recently, when he'd noticed how bad Tarik looked the day he came to hide here. The scattered panels of broken cargo boxes littered the floor, as well as the remains of some shredded material they put in packing boxes.

Tarik had made himself a bed from the packing material and an a few old tarps, the only real bed he slept in while on the streets. An ancient woven blanket scavenged from an abandoned apartment and some scattered household effects were all Tarik had of any real possessions.

He relaxed as the Gammorean left, locking the front door behind him. He snuggled deeper into his worn blanket, still snuffling uneasily. He�d caught a slight cold from sleeping in the rain the first night on the run, but it was getting better. He curled his tail around another blanket, pulling it closer to himself too.

The soft glow of the space heater cast a gentle orange-gold glow around his hideout, almost matching the color of his eyes. He shivered, whimpering softly as he snuggled back under the blankets. Somehow, he felt safer here, closed in like a nest rather than out in an open room.

A slight breeze squeezed in through the crack in the window, making the surrounding canvas sway slightly on their trellis of rope and steel. He sighed, curling his striped tail around himself and going back to sleep. The man in black wouldn�t find him today, not here. This place was far from Minero, and the clinic, and the huge, ugly building where the Emperor lived. The chill wind and rains here were caused by the fetid ocean a few blocks away, not by the buildings themselves.

In the quiet, his sensitive ears could pick out the crashing of the waves against the steel and concrete of the seashore buildings over the din of the rest of the city noises. That too was comforting somehow. He guessed he might be part water- dweller too, as well as tree-climber and hunter, and a few other skills he hadn�t taken the time to identify.

The gentle sway of cloth against rope, and the soft, rhythmic swishing sound of distant waves coaxed him back to sleep. His tail twitched unconsciously with the natural rhythms of the cool breeze and strange smelling sea as he settled back into his dreams.

~~~~~~~~~

A warm breeze blew across the sands. A strange creature stood on the top of the dune, the wind ruffling his brown-blonde hair. The scent of humans and machinery drifted on the breeze, along with the distant scent of stale water, forced from the dry winds by machines. The sun was setting, and he watched it.

Them, the dream corrected, there were two suns.

The human watched them set, sadness in his blue eyes. Someone called to him, and the image dissolved as he turned away from the setting suns. The bitter taste of wind-blown sand filtered across the dream and into memory.

This was important, but it would not be remembered, there was no reason to remember, it was a dream, and dreams fade with the dawn. But memories do not.

Somewhere in his deep memory, the scent of desert-blown wind laced with sand and lost dreams would be locked. He would not forget, because the human boy would remember, so he must remember his scent.

But morning comes so soon, even in the sleep of dreams.
~~~~~~~~

Tarik woke with an uneasy feeling in his stomach, green skin damp with sweat. His ears flicked nervously as he fought to slow his frightened breathing. The first few faint rays of reflected light from the rising sun sneaked through the window, finding a route through the buildings outside.

Tarik shook off the fading dream that had scared him, trying to remember what it had been about this time, but the images were gone before he had a chance to try to remember them. He yawned, exposing pointed teeth and stretching his powerful muscles. He suddenly noticed the pain in his leg was gone, it had finally managed to heal itself. He swished his tail thoughtfully as he studied the quickly healing stripe of lighter green skin where they had cut open his leg to straighten the broken bone.

He hopped up, pulling his newly-acquired pair of pants on over the shorts and loincloth. Something smelled different today. The ocean smelled fouler today, it was time to move on for a few days, until it calmed down enough for him to live here again.

Every few days, the water started to stink worse again, then it faded. Tarik would come back when the stench had died down enough, then leave when it started to stink again. A small price to pay for being safe.

He rumbled in a near-purr as he took one last look around his home. He�d have to pack everything back up into the crates and hide it. The Gammorean didn�t mind his living there, but others might take his belongings if they found them.

He snorted, shaking out his blanket and folding it up. He stuffed it into an empty cargo crate that was partially hidden behind one of the webs of cloth surrounding his sleeping area.

Maybe he�d make it this time, maybe the man in black wasn�t looking for him yet. Maybe he was just lying to himself because he didn�t want to run anymore. He snorted unhappily, setting the second blanket down on the crate half-folded.

It wasn�t fair, they didn�t own him anymore, he didn�t like running and hiding on the streets. He wanted a warm place to live, with no stink and no Stormtroopers, and no man in black chasing him every few years.

He shook his head, snuffling, there would never be that kind of place for him. He was property, escaped property, they would never stop hunting him. He growled to himself, re-folding the blanket and packing it back into the crate. They would never stop hunting him, but he would never stop running. He didn�t like the streets, but he liked the lab even less.

------

Tarik climbed out through the gap between floors that he used to come and go whenever he wanted to remain unseen. He watched the sunlight bounce through the corridors of glass and steel, making artificial rainbows in the morning mist. He sat on the ledge watching it, sniffing the breeze curiously.

Dead swimming creatures and rotting garbage, molding buildings and stagnant water, the foul scents met his sensitive nose like acid, but he sniffed at them anyway. The scent of burnt ozone and human was on the breeze. The two usually meant one thing.

Stormtroopers.

Tarik climbed toward the scent, up to one of the catwalks that laced their way through the city streets. He hid behind a lamp post, watching the empty street with suspicion. Every instinct in him screamed for him to run the other way, but he stayed frozen in place in curiosity.

A single white-armored figure with a heavy blaster rifle walked around the corner at the far end of the walkway, looking at the building he was circling. The clicking static of another trooper�s comlink reached Tarik�s ears from somewhere to the left. They were searching for something, or someone. He growled softly, remembering the ragtag group of humans and aliens he�d seen talking on his way to his hideout the day before.

Real Rebels, and they were hunting them, not him this time. He climbed over the railing and onto the walkway as the two troopers passed out of sight. He suddenly found himself facing a hovering droid of unknown make and design, something he hadn�t detected.

The droid let out a whooping alarm, drawing the attention of the Stormtroopers as Tarik covered his sensitive ears in agony at the noise. One trooper shouted something to the others, pointing at Tarik. He didn�t have time to try to understand them over the siren, he hissed at the troopers, taking off down the street away from them. He skidded down an alley where a vent shaft that led to another level was, only to stop cold in the alley in surprise.

A grate had been bolted down over the opening, and he didn�t have enough time to work the bolts loose like he had before. Orange eyes darted about the dead-end alley in panic, searching for a way out other than running back into the troopers. He pried at the grate with his claws for lack of a better option, straining to bend the metal even the slightest bit, but to no avail.

He whined anxiously, flexing his claws. Maybe he was part rock-climber somewhere along the line? He looked at the crumbling masonry of the walls, wondering how far he could climb before being shot at.

Not far enough, he thought as the droid�s alarm was silenced and he could plainly hear boot steps fastly approaching the alley. He hissed to himself, straightening the strap on his staff and backing toward a more defensive position as the first Stormtrooper came around the corner.

----on to Part 3 of Chapter 2---

© 2000 Michelle Petrosky

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