Chapter Text
CHAPTER 1
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Mindless
This is it.
This is it, you thought.
While your heart was almost quite beating out of your chest, your mind couldn't decide whether to panic or fully rest. After all, was there anything you could do?
Your right hand was curled lazily as it laid on the cold ground, hopelessly spread out between frozen blades of grass. Your weapon had rolled further away from you, yet it felt just so close to your motionless fingers. You felt so close, you knew you could just reach out and grab it.
But to no avail.
The battle was lost.
Various muscles retracted while your breath hitched. Your forceful landing on the grassy soil beneath you still lingered throughout your body. Your fingers twitched.
Was this really it?
Just mere moments ago, adrenaline helped rush you through a great and difficult battle, through pain and wound inflicted agony, through the anguish of your faithful ambition and reason.
Now, adrenaline seemed to only keep you awake.
You were weakened.
Your eyes fought to stay open, looking up into the early night sky. It was a dark shade of blue. The sun of this planet rose and fell slowly, stretching a rotation's time seemingly endlessly. You couldn't see any stars, only a faint shimmer of strange starships flying their usual routes far out the atmosphere.
Again, your breathing hitched. You felt your lungs slowly fill up with cold air finally, the pressure and stiffness of the impact before very slowly declined. The first breath that left your lips again shook.
No, you thought. This can not be it.
The cold wind around your skin turned slightly warmer. As it passed your deadly opponent, his lightsaber radiated with heat. He was getting closer.
The red light illuminating your demise flickered every now and then. Your body started twitching as you attempted to move, trying so desperately to move away, to not give up, to not accept your weakness.
Finally, the warmth hitting your face turned into heat. Your eyes fluttered shut in response to the brightness of the red saber held still in front of your face.
He was towering over you, his feet standing tight next to your head. He seemed calm, collected. But you still felt his violence, heard the growls that rumbled in his throat as you fought him, felt his rage spill all over you. How could you ever forget it? He was a menace, fear itself.
You could hardly believe you even made it this far. Yet, here he was, seconds away from finally ending you. Seconds away from claiming victory.
But to him, this was no victory. This was a nuisance.
"Pathetic," he snarled, his frown showing nothing but disgust. His deep voice sent another twitch throughout your body. It could all be over in just a second. You felt lost flakes of frost that had landed on your skin before melt under the heat and run down your skin. The fear that was burning inside of you drove you to open your eyes up wide, but the bright red light hindered you so much, it irritated tears out of you.
"All of this commotion... just for it to end like this."
He was right. You didn't need to attack him. You didn't need to encounter him at all. But you couldn't help it. You knew who he was. You knew of his past actions. You knew of his potential. You knew you couldn't let him stay on your planet. You couldn't take it. He ignited a fear in you that was rooted so deep, you couldn't avoid it. You couldn't live on knowing he was here — somewhere.
A known and feared Sith, thought dead for years, roaming the galaxy serving no one but himself? You couldn't believe the rumors.
Truthfully, you knew you didn't have a chance. You knew you couldn't have done anything about him. You knew a confrontation to be of no use. Frankly, you didn't even really know what you wanted to achieve. All you knew was that you wanted him gone.
You hoped to intimidate him, speak warnings and threats to him about staying on this planet. You hoped he would be weaker, wouldn't want to fight you when he had no one he served, no objective.
And frankly, he didn't. He didn't want to fight you.
But you interfered with his plans. You raised your voice. You didn't hide and avoid him. You didn't leave him alone in the first place. You were a nuisance.
And he hated that.
Another growl rumbled through his body after he waited for you to react. Nothing.
"You sounded so resolute when you demanded my departure. Where is your integrity now?"
With a provoking kick to your head, he concluded his question. Finally, your voice cracked and your throat forced you to cough.
"Why are you here?" he queried.
It was the first thing you had said to him that evening. After you had followed and approached him from behind, you had forced it out. Until this moment, he didn't give you an answer. You felt a hint of humiliation at his question. He turned it all around on you. You forced yourself to speak up.
"I'm here for you," you said.
"Why?"
"I told you already, didn't I?"
Your voice wanted to be meek, fear more evident in your body than ever. But you forced it to sound like a snarl.
Your opponent scoffed at your response. You were so weak, at the brink of death, at his mercy and still so brave? It was all for show. He knew it.
Surprisingly, he liked it.
He had no use for you, no objective, no reason to either care for you, nor engage with you. He had no care to kill you or keep you alive at all. You could have been a threat, like you had proposed. But after this fight and the way it ended, he knew that he was much, much stronger than you. It felt freeing. So he decided to toy with you, mock you for your bravery. A cruel smile started to form on his tattooed lips that only he could feel. He had nothing to lose.
"You have ventured out this far, taken all of this long path upon yourself just to follow and bother me. Did you truly believe you were able to defeat me? To kill me? Get rid of me?"
He slowly took a step around you, the tip of his lightsaber staying exactly where it was.
"Do you even know who I am?"
The arrogance was undeniable in his tone.
"Yes," you growled, your own anger coming back into you. You had never been able to forget his name. From the first moment you had heard of him, his person instilled a fear inside of you that was inconsolable. Now he was here. With you. On top of you, mocking you. His name didn't roll off of your tongue easily. With the growing humiliation and anger, you cared less about your dignity. "Darth Maul," you spat out.
A bigger breath thrusted out at once through his mouth in irritation. He hadn't been addressed as Darth in a long time.
In this moment, he fully grasped the imprint he had somehow still left in you. You believed in the old Darth Maul. Apprentice and successor to Darth Sidious, the most dangerous and powerful man in the galaxy. You didn't know of the trials and failures he had to endure during the past years, the humiliation of having been robbed of his own legs, the realization that he had been replaced so easily after having had devoted his whole entire life to becoming the perfect, flawless, most dangerous weapon, the endless longing for revenge breaking his mind and turning him insane in the end, the inevitability of a miserable, lonely death, had he not been shown mercy by his own brother. He was the culmination of tragedy, but to you, he was who he was born to be.
To you, he was the most dangerous Sith Lord. The man who killed so many Jedi, so many powerful people. The man who evaded sure death with the strength and power of the dark side, the force, the will. The man who'd get anything he wanted. The man who could rule the galaxy.
To you, he was Darth Maul, a phantom, a menace, fear and death itself.
It fueled him immensely.
He took in a deep breath and exhaled just as slowly, indulging himself in your fear and rage. It was like reverence to him. It had been a long time since anyone had reacted so fiercely to him. Even though you were so weak compared to him, you hit all the right buttons. He could end your life in this moment. You weren't a challenge. But right now, when he felt so deserted and aimless, your feelings felt like a treat.
He didn't think too much about it any longer and retracted his lightsaber, the sudden shriek making you gasp and hold your breath. It was suddenly so quiet, so dark.
Your aching body froze, your eyes wide open.
What was happening?
The blind spots from the red light restricted your view of sight, your eyes seemed to almost manically look around, trying to see something.
All of a sudden, you felt a thick and strong grasp on your throat.
No, you thought. Not like this.
It was the force, unmistakably. With an unforgiving grip that restricted your breathing, it lifted you up from the ground. Finally, your limbs could move again, fueled by the strong choking. Croaks and little shrieks filled the now cold air and your partially and temporarily blinded eyes looked around frantically for anything and nothing at once. Your hands were brought to your throat, reaching out for nothing but your skin. The force truly was strange. You had never encountered it in this way. It scared you. Panic settled in when you were brought into an upright position, but your feet were also kept in the air. He had pulled you up to eye level with him.
His glowing dark yellow Sith eyes were the first thing you could see again. They were right in front of you, pungent and sharp.
"Are there more of you?" he asked.
Your heart sank into your stomach.
What?
You weren't sure wether you imagined it or if it was real, but all of a sudden, the force seemed to have loosened around your throat a little bit, as if he was waiting for you to respond to him.
But you didn't know what to say.
"Are there more of you," he repeated in a more stern tone, the indulgence that had slightly been audible in his voice before, leaving him now.
"No," you croaked, unsure of what to do. Did he want to come for your people now? Did you just bring misfortune over your home? Did you anger him to the point where he wanted to get revenge and destroy your whole town?
Oh stars—
What did you do?
Panic settled in quickly and he felt it. His grip on you strengthened again and his lips dropped into a disapproving form.
"No?" he repeated, his impatience was inevitable at your inability to see through him and his cynical question. Of course you wouldn't understand. Of course you were nothing more than what you believed in your small, unimportant life on this uninteresting planet. Even when you didn't understand his real motivation of that question, you still dared to lie. As if he didn't know you had a people you belonged to. It annoyed him. With a little growl, his voice turned into a sinister whisper.
"Don't pretend you have nothing to lose."
With a small tug at the force hold, he pulled you a little closer to him.
"You have already lost this battle. Don't put anything more at risk. Don't be mindless," he advised. It drenched you in a degrading guilt like you've never felt before. Was this really what you were doing? Was this maybe what you'd been doing this entire time?
"You came to me with no goal."
No, you thought.
"With no ambition."
You wanted to protest.
"With no motivation other than your emotions."
Your eyes locked on his. He felt your emotions, didn't he?
His eyes looked you up and down, mustered you with a look you couldn't describe.
"You are driven by fear."
You could barely take it anymore. Spasming your body to try and free yourself from the everlasting chokehold became so tiring. You knew you couldn't help it. You had nothing to fight it. With the mention of it, the fear in you grew so much more.
He knows, you thought. He knows how inferior I am to him.
Slowly, his head tilted to the side ever so slightly. His left hand reached out to you to softly touch your chin. You squealed helplessly at the unwanted sensation. You wanted nothing less than to be touched by this man. To you, it meant certain death. You were already shown how much pain he could inflict on you without having to touch you. You couldn't even begin to imagine what a touch of his would be able to do. It felt almost electrical this time. You weren't sure wether it hurt or not, you felt so many different pains all throughout your body at once already.
"The fear is strong in you. You let it control you. Then, you make bad decisions. Such as lying to me." He brought his face a little closer to you at the last sentence. "Such as approaching me. Such as attacking me," he now spat out. The air felt even colder than before. Your eyes finally fluttered shut a few times in defeat to the choking. No, he wouldn't grant you unconsciousness.
Unexpectedly, his right hand replaced the force around your throat. You felt the sudden impact knock all air out of you and your eyes flung open in shock. You tried to gasp, but couldn't. Your hands rushed upward in panic and gripped the arm that was holding you up in the air seemingly on its own tightly, as if trying to hurt him so he would release you. But no, he was too strong and he had something to say.
"But when you let anger control you," he started, your body unable to let any air flow. "You survive."
After he spoke these last words so fiercely, he released you fully, letting you fall to your knees onto the frozen ground with a thump. Your gasp was so loud and so painful, your following breath turned into almost a scream. You held onto your throat tightly as you regained life into yourself in the fruitless hopes of protecting it this way. Your eyes were wide and focused on his black boots in front of your face, his words seemed to linger inside of your consciousness.
Fear led you to mindless decisions while anger let you survive, he had told you. And there was nothing in your body that doubted him. When you were scared, you felt helpless, weak. When you were angry, you felt brave and strong.
Was this Zabrak really lecturing you? It didn't feel like mockery this time. But you weren't able to think it through as he had deprived you of any oxygen. You could still feel every single finger on your throat digging into it, even though it was over now. He was so strong. He was so superior. You were at his mercy, nothing more and nothing less.
Your heart was still pumping up into your head and you felt a sensation you haven't felt in a long time. You knew what was about to happen. A great conflict arose inside of you. You didn't want this to happen, no. You couldn't pass out now, he would kill you! You couldn't defend yourself, couldn't talk him out of hurting someone else! You couldn't give up, no.
At the same time, you couldn't take it anymore. Something inside of you welcomed death. You were hurting so much. And when you were dead... you wouldn't be involved in what happened afterwards anyway. You hated yourself for that thought. And while you were conflicted, your vision failed you. Your head moved around slowly, unable to be held upright. Your arms gave in and you tumbled right there, right in front of him.
It was finally over.
The Sith Lord stood tall over your unconscious body, staring down at you strictly. He knew you would collapse now, after being handled so harshly. He didn't mind it. He already won your small battle. You were able to handle your weapon pretty well. Even though you looked like someone who would use a regular, boring blaster, you didn't even bring one. Instead, you used a spear like weapon with a hand sized, sharp top that radiated electrical surges. He had refrained from using his lightsaber initially to see what you were capable of. Avoiding and evading your weapon had been easy at first, when your fear made your movements more irrational and frantic. But the more you missed, the angrier you became and the better your aim got. His evading had to become more skillful and made him use the force to help his movement towards the end.
One time.
Once, you had managed to touch him. An electrical surge beamed throughout his body, zapped his hearts and turned the fight serious. It hurt him bad.
He had become furious, yelled out and then ignited his saber, throwing it towards you in a deadly spin with full force. You could barely manage to avoid it and threw yourself to the side, but as it had turned around to fly back into the Sith's hand, the blade touched the top of your left arm a bit. The horrifyingly painful damage soaring through your arm being so little in his eyes had only made him angrier and it now was the Sith Lord himself who shot at you, ready to strike you down. But when you glared at him with such terror and rage in your eyes after lifting your own spear in pain, he instead cut the weapon in half, using the force to throw the electrical part far away from the both of you, leaving you with only the handle. Rage shifted into horror when you looked down into your hand and realized you were defenseless.
The lightsaber had come way too close to you again when you quickly swerved away as good as you could. Again, and you stumbled backwards. His body turned around itself gracefully in a swift motion to get you wrapped up around his lightsaber this time, but again, you had managed to dodge it. Somehow.
The Sith couldn't take it anymore. With a forceful growl, he had erupted in frustration and flung his hand into the air.
An invisible force had yanked your body up through the cold winds of your planet and thrown you down so harshly, it knocked all air out of your cold lungs. The broken handle of your weapon had rolled out of your hand at the impact and left you defeated.
He had taken in the sight of you like that for a little while, waited for you to stand up and keep fighting him, evading him. But you hadn't. He had won.
And now? Now you were sprawled out on the ground beneath him again, this time unconscious. Depleted.
Darth Maul was lost in thought.
This planet was interesting.
Even though you looked like a peasant, you fought and dodged like a warrior. You didn't believe the Sith had changed the slightest since his rise as a Sith years ago. You feared him like no other. It intrigued him. Could your people possibly all feel the same way?
This could be his chance. He could take over this planet and rule it with fear and punishment. Memories of Mandalore came back to him and he growled.
"Maybe not yet," he talked to himself as he bent down to pick you up. "This needs a lot more planning, more strategy. I can't just get ahead of myself and try anything I am not yet sure of working."
He held you in his arms and mustered your limp body intently.
"I have already lost too much."
With that, he took determined steps toward his spaceship, bringing you along with him.