The smell of burning flesh was the first thing he would remember.
Thick, oily smoke twisted into the sky, rising in dark plumes that choked the stars. The camp- his home- was aflame, a dying corpse of fire and screams, its people butchered like animals. The child huddled beneath the remnants of a torn hide tent, his small fingers dug into the sand, eyes wide, throat locked in a soundless scream. He could not move. He could not breathe.
The Jedi was here.
A monster cloaked in fire and rage.
He moved through the camp with inhuman speed, a blade of hissing blue light carving through bodies as though flesh were nothing more than paper. The boy watched as warriors- hunters, fathers, brothers- rushed the attacker with gaffi sticks raised high, bellowing war cries. They fell before they could even touch him.
The blue light flashed- a limb spun through the air, blood arcing in ribbons. Another strike- a head rolled into the dirt.
The Jedi did not stop.
He was not a man, not even a living thing. His face was twisted into something primal, eyes wide, mouth curled into a snarl, breath ragged with fury.
The boy's stomach twisted.
This was no off-worlder come to steal their land. This was a demon.
A beast had come to rip them apart, to erase them from existence.
Some tried to run- mothers, sisters, children clutching at each other. The Jedi did not care. His blade cut through them as easily as the warriors. Their screams rose in a wailing chorus, only to be silenced in one, final, wet stroke.
The boy's eyes locked on his mother.
She was fleeing, her long cloak flaring behind her, one arm outstretched toward him. Run, child! Run! she was saying in their tongue. Go! Hide!
She did not see the Jedi coming up behind her.
The boy opened his mouth to scream.
Too late.
The blue fire ripped through her spine, erupting from her chest. Her body stiffened, her head tilting toward him- a final look, one of horror and regret- before she collapsed to the sand.
Dead.
Something inside him shattered.
The boy clamped both hands over his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut, holding back the scream clawing to escape. His chest tightened, breaths coming in short, frantic bursts. He wanted to crawl into the dirt, become nothing, disappear.
And then...
The Jedi stopped.
The air shifted.
The screams, the fire, the blood- it all faded into something unnatural, a pause that made the boy's skin crawl. His lungs burned from holding his breath, his muscles locked into stone.
He heard it then.
The heavy breath.
The slow, steady crunch of boots in the sand.
Coming closer.
The boy's eyes cracked open, his vision blurred with tears and smoke.
The Jedi stood still, shoulders rising and falling with each slow breath, his face shadowed by the flickering fire. His head turned slightly- like a predator sniffing out something hidden in the dark.
His gaze swept the camp. Passed over the dead. Stopped.
The boy's heart slammed against his ribs.
He was looking right at him.
The Jedi's expression darkened, his bloodied fingers tightening around the saber hilt. A knowing stare.
The boy felt it, something cold and invisible slithering toward him, wrapping around his chest like a fist. A strange sensation. Like the air itself was pressing down on him.
He knows I'm here.
A whimper slipped past his lips.
The Jedi moved.
Not fast. Not charging. Slow. Deliberate. A hunter approaching its wounded prey.
The boy's breath turned shallow. The tent fabric fluttered beside him, the only thing separating him from the monster.
The Jedi took another step forward.
The boy could see him now, truly see him- the sweat-drenched hair plastered to his forehead, the muscles coiled beneath his tattered robes, the blood splattered across his face like war paint.
But it was his eyes that made his stomach drop.
Not Jedi eyes. Not even human.
They were wild. Hollow. Burning.
The boy could not move. Could not run.
The Jedi raised his saber...
NOW!
The boy threw himself backward, shoving through the tattered tent fabric, landing hard on his stomach in the sand.
His feet scrambled beneath him, lungs heaving as he sprinted toward his speeder, a rusted old scavenged vehicle barely held together with metal plating and luck.
Behind him, the Jedi's pace quickened.
The boy leapt onto the speeder, fingers fumbling with the ignition. His hands shook too hard to grip it, and the fear- stars, the fear was in his bones, crawling in his chest, in his throat, choking him, choking him-
A flash of blue light reflected in his peripheral vision.
The Jedi was there.
His saber raised.
The boy slammed his foot onto the accelerator.
The speeder screamed forward, kicking up a wave of dust. A shadow leapt toward him- so close- too close-
He did not look back.
Could not.
The last thing he saw before the camp disappeared behind him was flames licking at the sky, and a blue blade slashing through the night like a god's wrath.
He did not stop riding.
He did not stop shaking.
And deep in the void of his soul, something dark and endless coiled inside him, breathing with him, growing with him.
The Jedi had taken everything.