That Which Nightmares Wrought

[Sarah_Kerrigan]

A creature summoned by Sarah's dream finds a home in Tier 7.

The streets were rife with trash; abandoned remnants of civilization that had tried and failed to establish itself this low beneath its poverty line. Criminals ran amuck and the pungent aroma brought many that had not grown accustomed to it, to their knees with persistent nausea. Although what else is to be expected - from landfills the leftovers and the scrapped wreckage - from the forgotten troubles of the Empire, their ‘lost’ memories of new beginnings, and the cost of order in what otherwise would in fact be considered an unstable society? It is among all the ruined tolls and pains of akin world-builders that care naught for those beneath them, that the possibility of insanity takes root. Those that are left to rot, become corrupted to the core. Although, life always finds away even in the insane, the enfeebled and forsaken parts of all realities. It exists.

A beast crawled about on all-fours, sniffing at the ground. Dog-like in form at a quick glance, but a studied gaze would see the horrible truth: a monster with fangs, spikes, tendrils and teeth. The purple flesh seemed hardened round a grey carapace, as though grown, then birthed with exact proficiency - an exact copy of what had came before it. Whence it came, it either could not recall, or simply did not care. And although its arrival left it disorientated, a quick survey as a trained spotter, gave it new-found purpose, a reason to exist.

It made light grunts upon finding out new scents and scouting their ultimate burial mounds, and uttered high pitched squeals at those shadows that challenged its presence. It may have been fast, scuttling and darting about, but it knew well enough that it was the only of its kind in the immediate vicinity. Its strength came through number and stealth. Any time any of the vagrants would draw close - perhaps wondering what it was that lurked about in the dark - it found a new hiding place. The creature would loiter, find a new scent and thereafter move on into other decrepit places. Caring little for why it was here, and even less about where it was.

It kept out of the way of the gangs of streeters; the loosely bound formations of humanoids it barred its sharp and many teeth at, and glared at through piercing-yellow eyes. Occasionally as it passed, rushing by, it would latch onto a wall or a broken bit of structure, lunging forward with a clawed appendage and swinging itself quickly around a corner, so as not to be seen by the chem-addict injecting his or herself (as the case may be) with a newfangled drug or mixed formula. Sometimes though afterward, it would linger studying the human’s reaction to the injection with an analytical mind, but never long enough to be discovered. Throughout most of its first night, it studied Tier 7 of Coruscant that was now its home, and its internal clock ticked on.

The morning after it had been summoned passed slowly. Many of those probed the night before now slept wherever they had fallen and passed out. Others though were fresh in the eyes, and actually treading along new territory, thieving what little of value they could find in the pockets of those still alive, and those that were dead. A few times, the menace had been seen and the onlookers had threatened to surround it entirely. However, a few quick springs forward and it bounded away from those whom were not so light-footed. Although bred to fight, this creature could understand when its prey was so feeble as to not be a threat. As the smell of death crept through every crevice of the locale, it determined that these were the castoffs of whatever lived here, and not worth any time or risk that came with pursuit and subsequent extermination. Information was needed, not blood and death.

Yet the thought solved nothing of its predicament. It’s not as though it lacked purpose: it knew it needed to procreate, to continue on adapt to any change as best it could, but the haze that enveloped its mind clouded most of its perceptions. It left only vague possibilities of where its kin may lie, and then no guarantee that any existed at all on this world. There was only that pang - the empty feeling - and the reverberation of a linked existence other than its own herein. Drawn across an incredibly distance, it would be foolish to seek it out, despite that fact that it could be tracked high above the current elevation. The attempt would most likely lead to an untimely demise. Still on its own, it could not permit its own destruction to serve that, which on this planet, did not exist. The information in its mind would at some time, prove useful, and until then it would remain alive.

The musing inside the now ever so quiet mind, left it vulnerable. A simple miscalculation, a lone misstep, and a single footfall too close, let its presence be known. Several figures stood tall. They appeared for all extents and purposes human, and seemed certain that the grotesque hound-like thing that peered at them, was not a product of their imagination, or a drugged-up hallucination, but instead real. They reacted as most do upon that which they do not know or understand, violently. Sprinting forward they donned what weapons they had, knives, shivs a hold-out blaster a few had - that probably did not work in the first place - and sought to intimidate through sheer number. They yelled a lot of what it assumed to be profanities, and made clumsy attempts to stab and strike it. A few laser-bolts missed their mark as well.

Nimbly the horror leapt, ran and outmaneuvered the sluggish humanoids. This they did not like, so they shouted more and others came. But by the time they arrived, they only saw their own brethren. In the meantime, it had slipped between a hole in their defense. Then, continued to trot further and further away. Finally, it latched onto the wall of one of the many smog-ridden factories that once brought rapid progress, and climbed as high as it could. There for a time it knew it needed to rest. With the thudding of its heart slowing, it shut its eyes and fell into a brief respite. When it would stir again, it would scout and learn more of the species that shared its home. After all they would need to be dealt with. Around where it laid a small tumor of gray grew and it breathed lightly, dreaming of a Terran with fiery red hair and striking green eyes: a telepath like itself. The creep crept from no apparent source whatsoever.