"Left Behind"

Chapter 3

The following morning, Tal was feeling even better. And, he was starting to get even more restless.

"OK, last bite," Tess said, spooning the last of the broth into his mouth. Tal sighed, trying to remain patient as she wiped the sides of his face. He was getting tired of being fed. A clone had his pride, after all.

"I have to go," Tess said, quickly heading to the kitchen, and dropping the bowl into the sink. She didn't even take the time to wash it. She seemed in an unusual hurry this morning. didn't even take the time to wash the bowl. Tal would gladly have washed the bowl, if he just could have gotten up. He would have gladly have done just about anything right about now. Tal watched, feeling mounting frustration as he watched Tess hastily prepared to leave. Why did she always have to leave so much? Time passed so slowly when she was gone. He was miserable being here alone without her. Didn't she know how awful it was trying to pass the time without her? Why couldn't he go see the shabla eopies? She shoved her feet into her boots, and grabbed her coat. She was still buttoning her coat, as she rushed out the door. "A storm is supposed to roll in today. I'm trying to get everything done before it hits," she hastily explained, not even looking up at Tal. Tal could tell her mind was on the eopie herd, and not on him. Without another word, she pulled open the door and disappeared outside. Tal got a good blast of fresh, cold air when the door opened. The cold air seemed so appealing, and right now outside seemed so much more desirable than being inside. He longed to just get up out of bed. His body ached from just being in the same position too long. Tal was absolutely, positively miserable.

He tried pushing himself to a sitting position. His ever-watchful droid keeper extended a sensor arm, took readings, and then poked him with another arm.

"-ooper -al, your injuries -re not sufficiently healed. -emain at rest."

Tal was tired of remaining at rest.

He'd been injured before, more times than he'd care to remember, but his recovery times had always been relatively quick. Tal's current surroundings weren't nearly as high-tech as he was accustomed, lacking the Republic's ultra-modern technology to quickly heal battle-injured clones and get them back on the job. Tal's recovery was taking much longer than he was accustomed. Tal looked at the door where Tess had just left. No, not left. She had abandoned him in favor of the eopies. Tal decided he hated those eopies, and he hadn't even met them yet.

Tal was so restless and bored today that he couldn't even count the ceiling beams. That might have sufficed for entertainment on the other days, but he had too much bundled up energy today.

His body was not built for long periods of sitting around. He was built for bursts of speed and sustained activity. This sitting around and inactivity was no sort of life for a clone. Tal could feel himself becoming increasingly restless as the morning dragged on. Tal strained to hear any sound at all of the military presence on the planet. After all, if Tess lived close enough to the battle zone that she ended up with him, shouldn't he be hearing gunships, tanks, or at least the distant sounds of munitions? He hadn't heard a single larty flying by overhead since waking up here. That alone was starting to frighten him. Where were the gunships?

If only he hadn't lost his helmet... He was finding it increasingly disorienting to spend his days without his helmet. His helmet always provided him with an endless supply of data, communications, access to the outside world. With his helmet, he could find out where the battle was, where his unit was, and find out when he was going to be picked up.

Yes, helmet. He needed his helmet. He knew he'd broken it. But maybe he could fix it. He was very good with repairing things. He excelled at that while at Kamino. Sometimes late at night, he'd even allowed himself to think of being in an engineering division, rather than just an ordinary combat division. But, then he'd squash any such thinking, because you went where the Kaminoans placed you. It was very bad to question their decisions in matters like that. Very bad. The Kaminoans didn't like that at all.

Tal pushed thoughts of the Kaminoans away. Those memories always left him feeling rather queasy. So he compartmentalized those thoughts back away. He went back to thinking about how he could possibly get his helmet back, and find out where the battle was, where the rest of his unit was, and find out when he was going to be picked up. Of course they were coming to pick him up…he had not been left behind. No, not him. He was not that guy. The one who just got left. Tal's restless musings were suddenly interrupted by OneOne.

"-ooper -al, would -ou like to urinate?" the droid waved the urinal enthusiastically up and down right in Tal's face.

The droid's sudden appearance startled him.

"Get that things out of my face!" Tal snapped, irritably, thoroughly annoyed that even the malfunctioning medical droid had managed to sneak up on him.

The droid leaned in and began taking multiple sensor readings, "-ooper -al, according to my -ensor readings, -our bladder is -ull."

"Stop reading my bladder!" Tal shouted irritably at the droid, pushing the droids sensor's arms away from his groin area.

"It is -ime to urinate -ooper -al!" the droid insisted, waving the urinal in Tal's face.

Tal grabbed the urinal, out of OneOne's grasp, and flung it across the room, "Enough, OneOne! I'm not pissing in that tincan!"

The urinal landed with a satisfying clatter on the farside of the room. In a fit of rebellion, Tal threw the covers off himself. He discovered he was completely naked, other than the many parts of him that were covered in bandages. He should have realized that before, since he'd been using the urinal now for a while. But, with the covers over him, he just hadn't made the connection.

"Find me pants!" he ordered the droid.

"I -ill have -o consult owner Tess," said the droid, heading for the intercom system.

"No! No consultations!" Tal said forcefully, "just find me pants! That's an order!"

The droid stopped, swiveling his dome to regard Tal.

"Pants, One One Two One-whatever your designation is! NOW!" Tal ordered, pointing imperiously toward the backrooms where he always saw Tess getting the supplies.

The droid hesitated, and then must have decided that Tal had sufficient authority to give him orders. It tottled off on its' noisy servos toward one of the bedrooms.

Tal slowly pushed himself to a sitting position, pleased to find that it didn't feel nearly as awful as on his previous attempt.

He could feel the skin on his back pulling and stretching, but it didn't tear. His ribs ached, but they were definitely getting better. He had the genetics to heal quickly, and with all the rest he'd been getting, his body had done a lot of healing. Tal heard One One returning. The droid had found a pair simple brown work pants, with drawstring waists, and lots of pockets. Perfect for working on a farm, and also easy for Tal to get on his condition.

"Excellent!" Tal said, accepting the pants from One One, "you have done well," feeling a bit weird offering up praise to a droid.

Tal wondered who these pants belonged to, and if Tess minded if he borrowed them. She'd talked a lot about family members who'd passed away. If these had belonged to them, well, hopefully she wouldn't mind Tal borrowing a pair. He didn't think had quite the flexibility to get into his bodysuit yet. Tal tried to bend over to put the pants on, and immediately felt his ribs loudly protesting the movement. He held the pants out to One One, "Help me get these on." Belatedly, he added: "If you would, uh, OneOne."

He wasn't sure what etiquette he should use with this droid, but figured it was better to stay on the droid's good side. The droid held the pants out at the right height, so that Tal could easily step into them. Tal stood up, keeping a bracing hand on One One. He drew the pants tight around his waist. He stood still for a moment, adjusting to being upright again. He felt very triumphant, just to be standing. Tal was amazed that along with his other injuries he hadn't broken or injured any bones in his legs. But, his legs were indeed undamaged.

With OneOne's help, Tal slowly made it over to the refresher. He was shaking and exhausted by the time he got there. He had to stay sitting on the refresher for several long minutes, shaking in exhaustion, before he even had the strength to urinate.

"-ooper -al, do you -eed help urinating?" OneOne asked critically, watching him from the entrance to the refresher.

Tal shook his head, and sighed, before responding to the droid, "No, OneOne. I don't need help. I'm just resting."

"-he -efresher is not -or resting. It is for for urinating," OneOne pointed out.

Tal got up on shaky legs, pushed the droid out of the room, and locked the door.

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Afterwards, Tal was so tired he fell asleep face down on top of his covers.

Tess slipped in the front door, removing her coat and boots quietly in case Tal was asleep. She liked watching him sleep. She knew sleep was the best thing for him now while his body was still healing. She was cold, wet and tired from the day's drenching rains, but wanted to get her "Tal fix" before getting changed. She turned toward Tal's bed, and stopped, surprised. He was dressed. Well, partially. He was wearing a pair of her dad's trademark brown workpants. Her dad must've had at least of a dozen of those pants. He wouldn't wear anything else. Tess hadn't been able to part with them when her dad had passed on. They'd been his absolute favorite. Whoa. Her dad had never looked like this in them, though. The thick brown workpants clung to Tal's muscular thighs, outlining just how well built he was. Tess hadn't gotten that good a look at him during that frantic first night when she and OneOne had been addressing his life-threatening injuries. Wow. The man was beautiful. And, his... thank goodness he was sleeping. Tess sank down into her customary chair, even though her clothes were still damp. She really should get changed first to avoid getting the chair wet. But, his... his glorious ass. There was no other word for it. She put her one fist to her mouth, and gazed at it in unabased appreciation. Dirk was an absolute ass. No doubt about it. He thought he had a great body. He had nothing compared to Tal. Tal had a great ass. It filled out those brown pants like they had been customized created just to frame that testament to great-

"Oh, hey," Tal muttered sleepily, "hi Tess." He opened his eyes, smiling at her. "You're back."

He reached his hand out toward her. His hand was warm, and Tess immediately took it in her own, "Your hands are cold," he murmured, still sleepy, then he looked up to her hair, "you're wet." He glanced toward the windows, "is it still raining?"

"Yeah," Tess said, "been coming down all day."

Tal went to push himself to a sitting up position. Tess immediately leaned in, grabbing on to him, helping gently pull him up. She was going to pull away, put Tal tugged on her.

"Stay," he said softly, pushing her down to a position sitting next to him on the bed.

Tess did, because it felt more natural to stay than to go. Tal pulled her hands into his, rubbing them and warming them.

Tess leaned into him, absorbing some of the warmth coming off of him, "Thanks, that feels really nice."

"You're really chilled," Tal said, slipping his arm around her. His arm just seemed to do it of its' own accord. It felt so natural to do so. Tess sighed happily, as she leaned up against his shoulder. She put one hand on his brown pants leg.

"These are new," she teased gently.

"I hope it's OK," he said, "OneOne retrieved them for me out of one of the backrooms."

Tess nodded, her head brushing up against his shoulder, "Yes, of course. They belonged to my father," she said, confirming what Tal had guessed, "he would've liked seeing them go to good use." She ran her hand idly down Tal's thigh, "besides, they look good on you."

Tal sucked in his breath.

Tess froze, and looked up at him in concern, "I'm sorry, Tal, did I hurt you?"

"No," Tal said, in a strangled voice, "not at all. I'm just fine, Tess, really."

She peered into his face, concerned, "Your face looks flushed, Tal. You're not running a fever, are you?" She quickly put her hand up to his forehead, and in the process, her breasts brushed up against his bare chest. Tal sucked in his breath again.

Tess looked at him again, "I need to let you, rest, Tal."

"No!" Tal protested.

But, Tess was already slipping out from under his arm. "I'm going to take a shower. Slip out of these wet clothes."

Tal groaned quietly to himself.

"Are you sure you're alright, Tal?" Tess reached her hand up to his forehead again. "Can I get you anything before I slip into the shower? A glass of water, maybe?"

Tal groaned again. Then, he shook his head, and carefully lay back down, and as soon as Tess was out of sight, Tal pulled the pillow over his head, and moaned in frustration. He tried to avoid thinking of everything that just happened, but the moment he heard the water in the refresher come on, all he could think about was Tess.

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