The boy remembers a time when he thought he was happy.
He had a family. He had the ocean. He had things that were his.
Then there was blood, and strong hands gripping him and tearing him from what he knew. And he was no one, nowhere.
The men who took him asked if he had a name. He told them, and they said that he didn't, that it would reduce his value if someone had to learn to whistle like him if they wanted to own him. So he doesn't have a name.
He does not know where he is, except that he is not in the waters of his birth. Not that it would matter. Without people, no waters are home. He does not have a home. He is nowhere.
He has one thing.
Coiled around his spine, embracing the core of him, is his lover. His lover, born only a few dozen days ago, implanted even more recently. The wound in his neck is still scabbed. He feels his hand twitch to scratch it at the thought, and his lover stills the reflex.
It knows what he knows. It does not know much else, yet, but it knows him, and loves him, and he can feel it.
It's almost worse that way.
The men who took him say they're headed for Korriban, to collect a bounty. They have a little pool of saltwater for him to sleep in, and a purifier to keep him from choking in it. He sleeps most of the time. The men don't mind that. They're still talking about what they'll do with the money when the ship drops out of hyperspace and they land on the roof of the great ugly stone building. Then they drag him out of his pool by the collar they put on his neck, and they drag him behind them into the building. (It's hot. If his lover didn't help him he doesn't think he could walk.)