Missing and Presumed Dead

Prologue

Authors note: Cover by AngelGidget

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The binary suns were just beginning to set across the desert sand, turning the pourstone of the Lars homestead dome from wind-blasted white to a muted orange and purple. Luke Skywalker stood at the edge of the crater, watching the suns set, as he did every night. Though the blistering heat of the day still permeated the dry air, the barest hint of a gentle breeze brushed the sweat-soaked curls from his forehead.

He didn't pay it any mind, only watched as the land around him grew darker and darker. Before long, he would need to go back inside, before the Tusken Raiders and other unsavory beings were out exploring the Jundland in full force. Though their home wasn't technically in the Jundland, it was close enough to present a danger to him if he stayed out too long.

Truthfully, Luke could never say why he came up to watch the suns set every day. He'd only been allowed up alone a few years before, when he turned eight. Before that, he'd had to wait until Uncle Owen or Aunt Beru were able to come up with him, and sometimes they'd been so busy finishing up for the night that he missed it.

Those hadn't been good days.

"Why do we do this?" Uncle Owen asked one evening after Luke insisted that he needed to go watch. Aunt Beru had already been asleep, and Uncle Owen looked like he'd been chewed up and spat out by a bantha.

"Cuz." Had been Luke's non committal answer. Though Uncle Owen groaned and grumbled about it, he'd dragged himself up with Luke anyway.

Perhaps Luke enjoyed watching the suns set because it was the only beautiful part about Tatooine. The suns turned the desert from a dry, flat, barren wasteland to a sea of colors. Now that Luke didn't have Owen's grumbling or Beru's nervous hums in the background to rush him, the pure, utter silence was almost comforting in a way nothing else on Tatooine ever would be.

But deep, deep down Luke suspected it was something else. Something he would never dare utter aloud, knowing how his uncle would respond. Something he only dreamed about in the dead of night, safe in his bed, in dreams that no one but him were privy to.

One day, he hoped to look out across the horizon and see not just two suns, but a ship. Each time he fantasized about it, the ship changed. A bulky freighter. A sleek, silver starship. A skyhopper. Or even just an old speeder.

But who was flying the ship never changed: his father.

His father was always faceless. He didn't know what he looked like. Owen never told him. Refused to, actually. But it didn't matter. Luke always recognized him anyway, and off they would go, flying off into the suns set as quickly as he'd appeared, off on an adventure.

But it was a dream. His father was dead. All that was left to him was a name he clung to despite his family's insistence that he take theirs. So as the sky began to darken, Luke sighed, turning away from the disappearing suns and began heading back to the dome entrance.

Just as he reached the entrance threshold, something made him stop, his small hand on the smooth pourstone. He stood there, staring at the door to the house, listening, a frown creasing his lips. Where he expected silence, minus maybe the noises of bantha moans carrying across the flats, he heard a high pitched whine, that increased with every breath he took.

As soon as he recognized it, his head jerked around, back towards where the suns were just beginning to disappear on the horizon.

There, speeding towards the farm, was a ship.

His breath caught in his throat, his mind whirling with possibilities. Was it someone from the Hutt clan coming to bully them into paying a water tax? Was it one of their distant neighbors coming to ask Uncle Owen for help fighting back Tuskan Raiders? Was it...?