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doorsclosingslowly · 3 years

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Your death is a number but I cannot count that high (14/17)

In which Savage tastes freedom. Zombie Savage AU | 2k | warnings for body horror, suicidal ideation, mention of sexual violence

The back is still against the doorframe, even though it takes all of Savage’s might to keep it rooted there. He only bothers because Maul is staring at him—Maul, his little brother, who is alive!—Maul is finally meeting Savage’s eyes, and he looks brittle enough that a mistimed movement might shatter his composure. Savage will not do that to him. Not in front of their enemies.

Their enemies: if Savage allowed the Mother’s body—no, that’s not right, Kenobi said it’s his brother’s—his—if he allowed the body he is inside to move, he would stand in front of Maul now, using his broad back to shield him from the man who mutilated him and laughed, and the Woman who might use Her power at any time to violate him. Savage would be the impenetrable wall that keeps him safe forever. Savage will be the wall. They will have to shatter it—to shatter him, tear him limb from limb, and obliterate even the chapped nail on his left little toe before they may pass. He will die before anyone touches Maul. He will never outlive his brother ever again. Even now, he can feel the cables slithering out of his chest cavity and the shrapnel taking flight, worming their way across Maul’s back in clear threat. One step towards my brother, and it will strike. I will. The destroyed ‘saber parts squirm out of his rib cage. Floor tiles uncrease as they scuttle out of the wreckage of his right eye socket, leaving a meaty chasm; and the repair kit debris that knit him together after his attempted death caresses his arm as it shimmies out. He is almost emptied of metal now, only an umbilical cord tethering his skewered heart to the trash wall that has metastasized into a creature like the dread rancour from Feral’s least favorite nighttime story. He is glowing green.

Kenobi is distracted away from Maul, gazing at the metal birthed from Savage’s body with barely veiled horror. The Sister looks nauseated. She has gazed appraisingly at Savage, gauging his use; she has smiled haughtily; her eyes have threatened sensual caress. From her current expression, she would sooner eat the carcass of a half-decayed veeka-bird than touch him.

Good, Savage thinks. Good.

He is safe from her, inside this patchwork undying body; he is safe and Maul is safe, now that Savage is too horrendous for these people to look at. He can read it in the blown white of their eyes: this body is too monstrous for Her to use anymore. It’s not the body of a mate, a tool, an opponent, but a loathsome and piteous creation that will revel in its new, raging, abhorrent triumphant freedom.

This is not the body the Mother gave him.

It’s not the body of the baby that Savage’s long-dead big brother cradled against his chest; not the body of a roughneck chasing his peers nor the body that sobbed before Maul’s empty crib and helplessly soothed Feral when he was little, the body that carried his brothers and fed them and shuddered with terror. It’s not the body Savage grew up in, the body he grew to become.

But it’s not the body the Mother gave him.

He allows himself to explore it, quickly. His fingers, metal and gnawed skin alike, are shy, but even they can feel some differences. The planes of immaculate muscles are gone. The body She made undid the scars of his previous hard-won life, a vain indulgence aimed solely at Her and Her ilk, but now it is overstuffed again with the proud marks of battle. He already noticed that the long powerful arm has shrunk—not the one he raised when She told him to kill Feral, that one’s long gone and replaced by Death Watch steel, but its twin is shorter again, the way it used to be—and shrunk, he hopes, shrunk too is the limp dick She engorged and crafted for a purpose he still does not want think about. He noticed these changes, before, absent-mindedly on his fleeing ship, but mourning the deaths of all brothers who ever lived he was far too miserable to care. He tallies up the evidence now with his fingers. No longer does Savage hit his strangely high head against doorframes and lamps he should have cleared. It’s so obvious, and he should have noticed it earlier, shouldn’t have needed Kenobi pointing out his liberation. This is not the body Savage grew up in, but it’s so much closer than he ever dared hope he could regain.

You created that body, Kenobi said to Maul. Accused him. You, Maul. You did this. Not Talzin. Not any Nightsister.

This single accusation is enough to turn upside down the current eternity of Savage’s life.

It was Maul.

The body was created by Maul.

It’s Maul: the fulcrum that changes everything. It’s hard to believe, to consider the body’s movements friendly after months of living in the dumb meat She made for Her weapon and after weeks of cursing the Mother for not letting him die, and Savage does not actually know what a technobeast or a mechu-deru is except that they are the thing he is, now—he will ask later—but the very idea that this is Maul’s doing creates nothing but utter, giddy relief.

It’s not the Mother’s body that Savage wears anymore. This body that averts Nightsister eyes in revulsion and that keeps murderous Jedi far from his brother, this body that let him stand up after a mortal strike and return to his brother who still lives, his alive, clever, precious little brother—it’s not a poisoned gift by Mother Talzin that unmakes the person he used to be and demands its price in his brother’s blood. The beating of his hearts—their silence, now—is no longer subject to the will of a heinous Witch.

No, Savage’s ingenious brother has found a way to tear him free from Her grasp. This body was made by Maul, it obeys him, and… it will not kill him.

Savage stifles his sob. They are in the presence of enemies. Still, his shoulders raise as the weight drops away, and the rancour of his innards curls around Maul in grateful adoration. This body will not kill Maul.

Maul made it. It obeys him. It won’t kill him.

Never again will Savage have to fear being used to murder his brother.

Never again, never again. Maul rarely allowed Savage to broach the topic, back before their separation after the attack of Maul’s evil Master, and if he did he insisted that he was far more powerful than Savage and therefore, if anything, he would kill Savage and not the other way around. Savage usually pretended that it soothed his worry, because he didn’t want to reject Maul’s unpracticed attempts at consoling him—and he was happy that Maul was so much stronger, even as he hated the treatment that had given Maul that power—but how could he stop being terrified he might be used to hurt Maul? He’d never worried about hurting Feral, and that had given him nothing but ruin. Besides, even the most impressive fighter will one day let down his guard, and the more time they spent together the less Maul seemed to even entertain the idea that Savage could be a threat. Maul slept leaning up against him; he turned his back freely; he joked about Savage’s cooking. The closeness was both joyful and terrifying. So Savage worried, and worried, and created schemes upon schemes that might stop him when the Mother’s body he was trapped in was used to attack.

Never again.

Savage settles into the body, for the first time since Feral died. He feels the background headache and the pulsating pain in his chest, but he also focuses on the fact that his eye line is at the height it was before he gave himself to the Witches. The debris crawling back into his bisected arm is not the Mother’s reluctance at giving up Her weapon but his brother’s love.

It is strange: Savage came here to die. He was ready to make an ally of the person who’d hurt his brother most in the world—bar one—to make Sidious bleed for killing Maul, but failing that…

He came here to die.

Kenobi, he’d decided, would mutilate him the way he’d torn young hopeful Maul apart. Maul had jabbered and raved about that moment often enough, early in their comradery or later-on unguarded after nightmares, and though Maul liked to pretend it was a lucky hit and Savage admittedly knew far less about lightsaber combat, the sheer cruelty of the cut suggested that it was deliberate. Having met the Jedi in the flesh twice afterwards just convinced him further. So Kenobi was supposed to dismember this meat prison—let the Mother keep control of Her weapon when its brain is in pieces!

Kenobi had refused to play his role, but he hadagreed to join forces against Sidious. Sidious was much more powerful than Kenobi—occasional sweaty nightmares against utter mindless terror—and if the Jedi would not grant Savage release, then both of them would challenge the Sith Lord. Kenobi, who’d hurt Maul, would die miserably. Savage’s misery would end in death. Two wishes fulfilled. He was going to die.

Freedom was death.

Death was the only mercy.

Mercy was more than he deserved.

Time ceased to matter after he thought he saw Maul’s death, and so he doesn’t know when he heard of the destruction of Dathomir, but—for the worst eternity of his life, he believed he was the last creature left of his murdered planet. He, who’d watched his brothers die and he who killed them. There was no glory in living on. Even if there was, he didn’t want it. He didn’t want to be alone. Every movement of his new body reminded him of the Mother, the Woman who made him kill Feral, the last person he ever wanted to remember, and there was no duty to a brother that would make the misery worthwhile. He wanted to die. He’d wanted to die since Feral, but after Sidious’ attack, there was no counterweight. No Maul.

Death was more than he deserved, but he could not help but yearn for it.

It wore itself deep into the grooves of his mind—no release from this body but death. No release until Her weapon strikes true.

But Savage is not a weapon now.

Maul, his clever clever brother, gave him a body that strikes fear into the hearts of Nightsisters and Jedi, a body that might even, now that Savage can consider the matter with a lens that begs for more than death, a body that might even be able to protect Maul from his monstrous Master.

Savage is not a weapon, and he is not alone.

Maul is here, standing before him and facing away from the Jedi who mutilated him and the Witch who once controlled Savage. Maul is alive, gloriously alive, and this undying body will be the wall that shields him. No-one will ever hurt Maul again.

There is still pain, in this body that Maul gave him. There is far more pain than in the Mother’s body, which smothered every feeling and every thought if he wasn’t careful; this body hurts constantly, but now Savage can recognize the near-forgotten brag. I am, the ragged ache that replaced his hearts screams. I’m mine. I’m no longer Yours.

He stands still, and watches Maul regain his composure and turn around. The rancour retracts, bleeding back into the body. Savage can feel its quiet shy reentry. The pieces of metal are trying, pointlessly, to cause as little pain as possible. Savage does not know whether he recalled them, or whether Maul did—they are reunited now, and nothing else matters.

#savage opress #savage oppress #darth maul #zombie savage au #dimtraces makes things

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danger-xylophones · 4 years

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Family Reunion Part 7. The Child

{Masterlist}

Notes: I screwed up the timeline of Star Wars because I didn’t think about it so, sorry.

Ps. I stan big-brother Therapist Opress

Warnings: Swearing, reader is a panicky mess for a little bit, some suggestive language

Words: 3246

Taglist: @and-claudia // @tararuthven // @ravenclawlegacy // @noiralei // @pinkiemme // @darthsmol

<- Previous

………………………………….

Forever

Forever indeed. It felt like Maul had been gone for forever. You hadn’t seen him in two months and they were some of the most excruciating months you’d ever lived through. What made it worse were the few and far between calls late at night that only made your aching for your unofficial husband grow. You were legitimately becoming concerned for as the time stretched on without contact, you began to feel sicker. Was it possible to get sick from missing someone? Is that what people meant when they described someone as ‘lovesick’?

“Y/n, are you sure you are alright?” Ki-Adi’s voice shook you to the core as you were forced to refocus on the fact that you were currently in the middle of a duel with him. Your master had lowered his saber, one hand held up to stop you from pressing your advantage while he questioned you.

“I’m fine, Master.” The reply was immediate and spoken without thought. You knew you were just being dramatic and that your life had to go on when Maul wasn’t around. You were to become a Jedi. He was a Sith Lord. Divergence from each other was what founded your relationship and when that manifested in not seeing each other for months, you had to learn to deal with it. The whole ‘feeling sick because my husband isn’t here to hold me’ thing was getting old fast.

Your husband....gods, those words didn’t seem real. Legally binding or not, the fact of the matter was that you had married Maul in total secrecy two months ago. You could remember the moment he claimed you as his wife so clearly that on the most lonely nights it seemed to become the only thing that was real and untainted by hypocrisy, hubris, and politics. The knowledge that you were the only one who would ever know the feel of Maul’s hands on your hips, or the gentle nudge of his nose against your own as he pressed his lips to yours, or even how solid he felt when buried in-

You internally shook your head. Yes, the knowledge that you were the only one that would ever know how any of that felt was...intoxicating. And you were selfish. Maul’s love was a drug and you were the only one that had access to it.

“Are you sure? You seem very distracted.” Ki-Adi continued, blocking the strike you levied at his side.

“I’m. Fine.” You seethed, frustrated at your mind for wandering and at your body for how poorly you were fighting.

Ki-Adi sheathed his saber and raised an eyebrow at you, hands finding a place clasped behind his back. He was disappointed. You sighed and sheathed your green saber as well, already preparing for the inevitable lecture. “I do not believe you, Y/n. You haven’t been acting like yourself since we returned from negotiations on Toydaria.” Ki-Adi stepped forward to grasp your shoulder, communicating his concern more clearly than his perpetually calm voice would allow. “Did something happen?”

You shifted on your feet, knowing you would have to lie. There was no way you could tell him that you were lovesick but you could explain the physical symptoms your predicament had manifested. “No, master, nothing happened. Just...I don’t know how to explain it.” You carded a hand through your hair briefly. “For the past few weeks, I haven’t felt...like myself?” You tried, looking into your master’s calm face.

Ki-Adi’s brows furrowed. There was no condemnation in his eyes, only curiosity. “What do you mean?”

“I mean...I can’t remember the last time I got a good night’s worth of rest. For some reason, certain smells have been bothering me lately, I’m so tired all the time-yesterday I passed out in the library and Madame Jocasta had to walk me to my room because I couldn’t walk more than a few steps without feeling nauseous.” You let out an angry huff directed at the strange reactions your body was having to the absence of Maul. “But, every time I’ve considered going to the healers to see what is going on, the symptoms vanish.”

Ki-Adi was quiet for a moment as he digested the revelation. “Do you know what might be causing these reactions?” He eventually asked, taking a seat in the middle of the mat you had been fighting on. You followed his lead, sticking your chin in one hand and propping your elbow on your bended knee while your free hand toyed with a rogue string on your robe. You shook your head, eyes boring into the ground. “Are you, perhaps, nervous for the Trials?”

You shook your head again, straightening up. “No, I mean...I am just a bit nervous but I know that these reactions aren’t originating from that. I was more nervous about making my second lightsaber and this never happened.” Your stomach gave an almighty lurch all of a sudden which caused you to clasp your hand over your mouth, the other shooting to your stomach. But, just as quickly as it had come upon you, the sensation vanished leaving you and your perplexed master. You groaned in frustration, almost wishing you would just vomit so that whatever was going on would cease. Ki-Adi sent you a sympathetic frown, helping you to your feet. “If I may forgo discretion, master?” He hummed to tell you it was alright. “I spoke with Luminara Unduli and she posited that it could just be an intense bout of pms. Which would make sense…” Because I’m late…Like,...two months late. And with that realization, a whole new plethora of issues became very likely possibilities. No, no...we...Maul and I aren’t even the same species. That can’t happen...or can it? Zabraks are classified as Near-human. In theory, we could...no, no.

“Hmm, this is troubling. May I suggest that you go to the healers, Padawan? Even if Master Unduli is correct, I think it would be wise to receive confirmation.” Ki-Adi, ever tranquil in his approach, thankfully rescued you from the spiraling panic now coiling in your chest. “Come, I will escort you there.”

…………………………………….

“Y/n?” Savage’s rumbling baritone voice pulled you back to reality and you suddenly realized that you had been zoned out for a very long time. When had you started deep cleaning the ship? Looking away from the floor of the cockpit you had started diligently scrubbing, you met the towering zabrak’s questioning gaze as he leaned against the doorway. “Are you alright? You’ve been cleaning incessantly since you woke up.”

Briefly letting your eyes flicker over the various cleaning supplies strewn around you, you shrugged, mouth feeling dry. “I...I guess.” With a little more focus, you returned to scrubbing, eager for some distraction. “I’ve just...been lost in thought, I guess.”

“I noticed.” Savage stated bluntly whilst crossing his arms. “I’m worried about you, sister.” You paused at his words, momentarily closing your eyes as you collected yourself. You could hear him approaching, long strides echoing around the small area as he neared until he crouched next to you and gently worked the rag out of your hands. “You have not been yourself for the past few days.” Your eyes snapped open and slid to the side to meet Savage’s gaze. His brow was worked into a frown and one of his large hands was hesitantly reaching out, as though he was unsure if he was allowed to console through touch.

Opting to let him in, you reached out and grabbed his hand. “I’m afraid seeing Maul in this state has...drained me. I just needed a reprieve and I guess shutting down was the way I went about achieving that.” As you spoke, you let your thumbs dig into his palm while you used him as an anchor. “And,” glancing around Savage to see into the makeshift sleeping area the three of you had set up, you took note of how Wild was still completely passed out which made it safe to make your confession, “and it isn’t helped by the lying on my end. I want to tell Wild the truth, but I’m terrified of how he’ll react. He’s lived his whole life believing his father to be dead. What will he do when he finds out that he’s not and that he was, in fact, a Sith Lord? I don’t want him to go into shock over it but how the hell am I supposed to adjust him to the idea organically?” You muttered more to yourself than to Savage who was still patiently crouched next to you, happily lending an ear.

Savage’s breathing was the only thing you could hear, low and steady like the breath of a mythical beast. It was soothing to hear something other than your own panicked thoughts. “I wish I knew how to help you, Y/n. I care for Wild and I care for you too. The three of you are the only kin I have left.” He sighed and finally took a seat beside you, still allowing you to toy with his hand.

“I hadn’t thought about that...how are you holding up?” You tried carefully, releasing Savage’s hand when he gently tugged it away from you.

“Not well, if I am to be completely honest. Though-I have the benefit of not remembering what Maul used to be like.” Savage’s voice dropped to barely above a whisper.

Not entirely sure where to go from here, you opted to voice the most pressing anxiety that plagued you without ceasing. “Do you really think Mother Talzin will be able to help him?”

“Help him? No. Bring back Darth Maul? Yes.”

……………………………………..

“Padawan L/n, these results are...most concerning.” The words falling from the Mirialan healer are...disconcerting which causes you to sit up, propping yourself on your elbows as you rise from the bed to watch her movements.

“Why?” You ask, sitting up a little further as your panic makes a resurgence. “What’s wrong? What do they say?” She didn’t reply nor did she turn to look at you as she raised a hand and flicked her fingers in unison to beckon you over. You swung your legs over the edge of the bed and walked over to the screen that was displaying the results of the full-body scan she had run to pinpoint the epicenter of your troubles. The particular area of interest was a position that was decidedly not your stomach like you thought it would be. Oh no. “W-...what does that mean?” You asked, trembling. Your throat was swiftly closing up as you continued to stare at the red circle that blinked placidly above your uterus.

“Y/n, you know what it means. Coupling the scan with your other symptoms, I think the issue is impossible to deny or misinterpret.” The Mirialan was bristling as she spoke, the sympathy draining from her voice with every word till it was sucked dry of any humanity. “I must inform the council immediately.”

Inform the...shit. Whirling around faster than you thought humanly possible and leaping over the bed, you practically tackled the healer to keep her from leaving the room. “Dariada, listen to me. I don’t know how this happened.” You attempted to explain, hands grasping her left forearm in a vice.

She made a noise of utter indignation that echoed in your head. “You don’t-how could you not know?! You slept with a man, Padawan L/n, that’s how this happened. You broke the code! They’ll expel you from the order for this!” She was livid.

“They could if I had broken the code! But I didn’t! I didn’t sleep with anyone!” Liar. Liar. This baby’s mother is a liar. Maul, fuck, where are you? One hand shot to your front, gently laying over where your womb was. “There was no one. I swear.”

“That doesn’t happen, Y/n. You had to have slept with someone.” Dariada shot back, hood dangerously close to flying off. Her vibrant green skin was a shade darker from the blood rushing to it in her anger. You had never liked Dariada, she was always far too self-righteous, but you liked her even less now. With what could only be described as a snarl, she wrenched her arm free and grabbed both of your wrists in an iron grip, already marching her way out of the hall and dragging you along with her. She held true to her word and informed the council of the...situation.

Soon you were standing in the middle of the council members, begging for them to believe you that there had been no one. The lie felt like poison on your tongue, it seeped into your own system just as it flew at the council members. Plo Koon was the first to believe you. “I can sense much fear in you, padawan. Why?” The Kel Dor had asked amidst your muffled sobs. There was no hint of condemnation in his modulated voice, but, instead, compassion and empathy.

“With all due respect, Master Plo, I just found out that I’m pregnant and I can’t even explain how it happened. I am not ashamed to admit I am terrified of what is to become of my baby.” You turned towards him, hiccuping and blubbering throughout your confession.

“Only your baby?” Plo Koon asked, raising the ridge where his eyebrow would be. You were painfully aware of the gazes of each individual master on you. Ki-Adi’s was the heaviest of them all.

With a swallow, you attempted to calm your nerves. Maul could help you. Maul would help you. You just had to get in touch with him. But what would his master do to him, to your baby? The tears began anew. “Only my baby. I can be expelled from the order and find a way to survive but what of them?” No answer was needed for your question. The implications were clear.

“Padawan, approach.” Master Yoda’s voice called to you as he beckoned you closer with his three-fingered hand. His expression was unreadable. You did as he commanded and the old master closed his eyes and held his hand out in front of him when you were little more than a foot away from him. “A child of the Force, the babe is. Clouded is their future.” The grandmaster sighed heavily, letting his head and hand fall in time. “Expel her, we cannot. Powerful will the child be. We must not let either of them fall to the dark side.” Murmurs fell from the masters, sneaking past you as they slipped from loose lips.

“But is she telling the truth, Master Yoda?” Master Tinn was the one to voice the question on all of their minds.

“She has to be, Master Tinn.” It was Ki-Adi who spoke in your defense. “Dariada said that she was approaching nine weeks, in that time, the only instances where Y/n has left my sight was when she was in the temple. Y/n is predisposed to the light side and has never broken the code before, to assume that she would to this extent is unwise and unfair to my padawan.” You sent Ki-Adi a grateful smile as he rose from his chair and approached to stand beside you in front of his fellow masters.

“What are you suggesting we do then, Master Mundi?” Mace Windu asked from your right.

“Put Y/n’s training on hold and postpone the trials. We will keep her in the temple to watch over her and when the baby comes, I think it would be wise to look into training them.” Ki-Adi offered swiftly to muttered agreements.

With a tap of his staff, Yoda called the room to him. “A wise decision that is, Master Mundi. Watch her closely, you must. Now,” He focused on you, eyes penetrating your defenses till his gaze seared into you, “fetch Master Qui-Gon Jinn, young padawan, know something of this occurrence, he might.” You dipped your head to bid the council farewell before skirting away from them. As you fled the meeting area, one thought remained. Where are you, Maul?

…………………………………………………

Maul was being a nuisance. You had gone into the cargo hold in search of more ration bars and thought that he had still been asleep. You were correct, he was still in the same place you had left him last night. Or he had been until Savage came stomping in after you and woke him up. Now, he was acting like a feral tooka; hissing and spitting at Savage while you, once again, trapped behind him. Savage had backed off with his hands up to show surrender but Maul hadn’t relented and you were rather fed up with it. “Savage, go get me a damp cloth, I’ll try to calm him down.” You ordered whilst nodding your head to Maul. Savage was eager to help calm his brother and so, swiftly backed out.

Meanwhile, you worked to soothe Maul once more, delicately coaxing him to lay down with his torso across your lap. Gentle purrs rumbled in his chest while you worked your hand into the perpetually tense muscles in his back. Savage entered once more, quietly this time, and handed the cloth he had gotten to you. You used the rag to dab at the junctures of Maul’s body. You hoped the motion would be soothing. His fever had broken sometime during the night but you were still trying to ensure he was kept comfortable for the remainder of the journey.

Before the silence could persist for much longer, Savage broke it as he leaned on some stacked crates across from you. “Did Wild mention the tattoos to you?”

Looking away from Maul and to the door to the hold, you made sure the three of you were alone. “Yes, he told me he had been talking to you about Dathomir and the Nightbrothers.” You brought your gaze back to Savage who seemed a little hesitant to continue talking.

“Did...did he tell you why?” You shook your head. Savage sighed heavily and slid down to be seated. “I’m afraid Wild suspects we are hiding something from him.”

“I knew he’d start to.” You muttered under your breath, subconsciously gripping the cloth tighter. “Did he say anything?”

Savage shook his head, “No, but he was asking a lot of questions regarding Maul. I answered as many as I could.”

“Wild’s always been perceptive, I knew we couldn’t hide this forever. But, did he tell you why he wanted more? He told me you had offered to help him.”

The yellow zabrak groaned, pulling one knee up to use as an armrest as he averted his gaze to Maul who had taken to playing with your free hand. “All he said was that he could feel something coming, something monumental.”

Your brows furrowed. That was...news. Why hadn’t he talked to you about this? Probably because you’ve been keeping secrets from him, you lying piece of-

The door suddenly slid open to reveal the boy of the hour. His...cold saffron eyes zeroed in on Maul before flicking away to Savage and then yourself. His face was stiff. “We’re approaching Dathomir, I took the liberty of starting landing procedures.” His voice was clipped and serious, more than it normally was. With one last glare at Maul, he turned and stalked towards the cockpit.

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#darth maul #clone wars #tcw #star wars

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fallenrepublick · 4 years

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I need some adorable as stars fluff for Feral! So, basically, he either lives or escaped (you choose) and finds himself on shili, the togruta homeworld. Fast forwards several years (savage lives!), when savage and maul are actually on Shili(for whatever reason), and Savage sees a small child, hale togruta and half zabrak and follows them to their home....where there is Feral, who actually has a wife, and a family, three sons and a daughter on the way. Overall, adorable family fluff and reunion!!

This was hard as fuck to write

And not just because I spent twenty minutes calculating the distance between Dathomir and Shili and determining that it would take someone four days, ten hours, and nine minutes to get there through lightspeed with a class 4 hyperdrive.

Warnings: None probably

It was the biggest stroke of luck he’d ever heard of. Having been tipped off by an elder Night Brother who was tired of losing so many of his people’s lives, it occurred to Feral that Savage being taken away tipped his odds of survival against him, and his best shot would be to leave while his head was still on his shoulders.

He scrambled away from the village, taking one last look at the place that was once his home. The creaking buildings and aged bridges that spanned the area gave him a strange sense of dread, as if the place was more of a prison than a place of comfort. The only positive memories he had of the place was when Savage was with him, but now that he was gone, there was no point in staying.

In terms of getting off-planet, there weren’t many options. The barren rust-hued landscape was a good option for ships to land on if anyone came down to see the Night Sisters for one reason or another, but those instances occurred few and far between. Ducking behind large rocks and sprinting across the open spaces, his eyes scanned the terrain for anything that might be useful. He’d be grateful for even a speeder if he found one.

The ground shook, the sand and rocks that peppered the stony floor beneath his feet clicking as they trembled. His balance threatened to give out with the tremors, but he held fast, waiting for it to subside. He took it as a sign that his window of opportunity was waning, and as the sun lowered on the horizon, it took with it his chances of escape. Sometime soon, they would notice he was gone, and if that happened when he was still nearby, they’d find him almost immediately. He thought of Savage and what he must be going through, subjected to Talzin’s magic and Ventress’s undeniable cruelty. He wondered if Savage was still thinking about protecting him, and the guilt began settling over his hearts. If he hadn’t been so weak and foolish, maybe Savage wouldn’t have been taken away. Maybe they’d still be together.

Shaking it off, he convinced himself that his fear and regrets had to be dealt with later. He continued on his path, now with a more fervent sense of urgency and mild panic. Across the way, backlit by the sunset, sat a ship, dark and old, most likely belonging to someone the Sisters had killed long ago. His hearts raced as he hurried to the vehicle, climbing into the cockpit, whose front window had been covered in dust by ages of heat and harsh rock storms. He wiped away at the glass and pressed the buttons on the console, practically begging it to start up.

“C’mon, c’mon…” he groaned, the dead dashboard causing an ache in his chest. “Just one more miracle, please.”

The console came to life, the rumbling of the engine in the ship soothing his fears. He smiled to himself, unsure if it was luck, or the ship, or some benevolent god that had listened. Regardless, he took hold of the controls and began his ascent. The ship rose through the atmosphere, and he was whisked out, passing the clouds above and entering the starry cavern of space above him, leaving his past and dangers behind. When he turned around to watch the planet shrink into oblivion, he thought he saw a small spec of green light pulsing from the surface.

He didn’t really have a plan beyond his escape. In all fairness, he hadn’t thought he would get so far as to actually escape unscathed, and now, floating around the vast emptiness that had before seemed so far away, he wasn’t sure what to do or where to go.

Pulling up a map stored in the ship’s database, he was painfully aware that his fuel wouldn’t last forever, so a decision had to be made. Ultimately, it boiled down to only a few systems that were nearby enough to reach, but not too nearby that he’d be easily tracked down. His target landed on Shili, a planet located in the Ehosiq Sector within the Expansion Region. Traveling coreward would give him a better chance, since it was rare that any of the people that might want to find him would dare travel in that direction. Further, the planet was under the control of the Galactic Republic, and had been since the Republic’s earliest years. He might not be noticed there, but the people sent to look for him definitely would be.

Over four days of travel and lots of contemplation about his next move later, he exited hyperspace and gradually lowered onto the planet’s surface, the environment lush and green, plants and trees sprouting up from the ground around him, almost inviting him to come and at least rest for a while.

He leapt out of the ship, taking in the scenery. He’d never seen anything so… alive. His planet had been horribly gloomy, the only living creatures he interacted with either his brothers or viscous, territorial creatures that wanted nothing to do with him except probably eat him.

In front of his ship stood a tall tree that caught his eye, though not for its height, but instead for the person that stood behind it. She was a togruta, a native to the planet, striped head-tails falling over her shoulders and on her back, light green skin almost blending in with the flora that seemed to encase her. He wasn’t sure what to do in the situation, mouth opening to say something, but no words coming out as he found himself unable to find anything worth saying.

“Hello,” the woman offered, still half-hiding herself behind the plants. “Who are you?”

Shocked at her forwardness and his lack thereof, Feral snapped to attention, straightening himself to seem more approachable, or at least vaguely respectable. He doubted it was working. “I-I’m Feral,” he replied, trying to make it sound like he wasn’t nervous. “I was, uh, trying to escape my planet. Y-You see, there were people after me and, w-well it all started because-”

“You’re hurt? Hungry?” she asked him simply. “You can come back to my town if you need help.”

Help. It wasn’t an entirely foreign concept, but this would be the first time in his life that he would be accepting it from someone that wasn’t Savage. Saying yes felt… wrong, but he was in no position to deny it.

“If… If it’s not too much trouble, maybe I could stay there for a while? At least to get my bearings straight.” he responded finally, brushing himself off and rubbing the back of his neck, unsure if what he was doing was even allowed.

The girl snickered a bit at his nervousness and hesitation. “I offered, didn’t I?” Spinning on her heel, she tread through the woods, assumingly towards her village. Feral scrambled to catch up with her, following her every step over fallen branches and various plants. Wish as he may to make conversation, he couldn’t think of anything to say.

Thus, the journey was silent, save for the occasional warnings about ditches and hazards that lay on the path. But Feral found himself unable to contain his amazement when they reached their destination, the design of the buildings unlike anything he’d seen before, and an overwhelming sense of comfort in its inhabitants seeping into his own skin. Sloping architecture mirrored the look of Togruta head-tails, and the vibrant colors blended into the environment as if they occurred naturally.

She led him to a smaller building to the side, a lone point situated far from the chaos of the general populous. As colorful as the outside was, the interior was relatively unassuming, simple

yet comfortable furniture peppering the floor, mostly made of wood and natural materials. He sat at the table near the kitchen, fidgeting as he did.

“I never asked your name…” he offered, trying not to meet her eyes as she walked about her space, gathering various food items.

“Madin. Yours?” She didn’t look up, clearly deliberating between one biscuit or another. She eventually shrugged and decided on both.

“Feral…” he said softly as she set food in front of him. Silence followed, and as Madin sat across from him confidently, he realized that he had no idea how to have an actual conversation.

“You seem so nervous,” she laughed. “I don’t bite. Most of the time.”

“I don’t want to be too much of a problem,” Feral said, his voice shaking slightly. “A-And th-the fact that you don’t really know me may seem like an issue or-”

“From what I can tell,” she began, tracing a finger along the edge of the table. “You have a…” She thought for a moment. “Behm d’ghe. A heart of warmth.”

He laughed nervously. “Well, I do have two of them.”

“Hearts of warmth, then.”

“Remind me again what we’re doing here, brother?” Savage asked as he sat in the cockpit of the ship, accelerating in the direction of their new destination.

Grumbling, Maul removed his feet from the dashboard and turned to his brother. “The planet is relatively defenseless, and as far as I’m concerned, taking it over to add to Mandalore’s power base is nothing short of beneficial to us. Got it?”

Savage’s expression was reminiscent of someone who did not, in fact, get it, but he didn’t bother arguing. Whatever Maul was up to was clearly better suited to his mind than anyone else’s.

Landing on the surface of Shili, Maul exited the ship and began walking away, turning back only to tell Savage, “Stay here until I return.”

Obliging his brother’s order, Savage stood beside the ramp, eyes glazing over the environment. Everything was bright and colorful, almost too much so, and he found himself wanting to leave at the first opportunity he saw. That is, until he saw something that gave him pause.

A child. And it looked… like him. Small and carefree, the male Zabrak wasn’t just a zabrak. Instead of horns were a pair of short, striped head-tails that framed his round face. When Savage approached him, he beamed, eager to speak to him.

“Whoah!” the boy exclaimed when he saw Savage in front of him. “You look a little like my father!” The thought that went through Savage’s mind upon hearing that had to be pushed down, as it was impossible. Though a hint of it lingered in the back of his head. “C’mere, I’ll show you!” The child turned and began running in the direction of his home.

Hesitant to follow the child, Savage worried about Maul returning soon to find him gone, but his curiosity overpowered it, and he found himself behind the child anyways. Instead of logic, Savage began trying to reason through all of the ways his assumption could be correct. After all, he hadn’t seen him after being taken away by Ventress, so his fate was still unknown.

In front of the boy’s house, two more boys that looked very similar to his guide ran to and fro, playing with sticks and yelling about winning some game or another. A woman stood to the side, visibly pregnant and holding a hand on her stomach, smiling and laughing as she spoke. Savage stopped walking, no longer trusting the vision before him.

Feral looked up, spotting Savage’s presence out of the corner of his eye. Almost immediately, his eyes lit up, mouth widening into the biggest smile Savage had ever seen on him. He began rushing towards his brother, Savage hurrying to meet him halfway.

“Savage!” he exclaimed holding onto the sides of his brother’s arms. “You got taller!”

“You were here the whole time…” Savage trailed off, still wary of what he was experiencing. Feral had become noticeably healthier, stronger and more confident in how he held himself. He was almost unrecognizable.

“I got lucky.” He looked over at the woman who had come up beside him. “And then I got luckier. Savage, this is Madin. She helped me when I first got here and then…”

“And then he wound up stuck with me the rest of his life,” Madin hummed. “The three monsters are Terren, Forta, and Uta. In that order. This here is going to be Shin, the only girl, unfortunately for me.” She rubbed her stomach thoughtfully.

Savage was frozen in place. Everything had changed so quickly, and though he should have expected it, he had half-wanted Feral to stay the same. But now, with his new responsibilities to Maul and his seemingly never-ending schemes, he was glad Feral had found his place.

He stepped forward and hugged Feral, practically lifting him off the ground as he did so. “I still can’t believe it!” Being set down, Feral rubbed his chest to return the air to his lungs. Savage motioned to the house. “I must hear everything about your life now.”

Maul’s mission would just have to wait.

#feral #savage opress

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arwenkenobi48 · 7 years

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The Feral Opress Headcanon Masterpost

Yep, this is gonna be a pretty long post.

Canon Star Wars Timeline:

Feral was the youngest son of Mother Talzin. He was born almost two months premature and had a twin who died at birth. Feral himself almost died because he was very weak. Talzin rejected him because of this. However, the Nightsister Kycina believed there was hope for him and raised him in secret. Once he was strong enough, she delivered him to the Nightbrothers, directly to Savage Opress.

Feral was very quiet and shy as a child, preferring to stay Savage’s side. He would cry at the slightest thing, resulting in his peers calling him a crybaby. Savage would defend him every time.

There are a large number of blue moth-like insects that live on Dathomir, in the caves surrounding the Nightbrothers’ village. Feral watched them when they come out at night. They often settle on his nose and/or horns.

Feral was a late bloomer when he reached adolescence. He even still had four of his milk teeth. As a result, his markings developed later than other Nightbrothers and it made him very self conscious and physically uncomfortable. Poor little babby </3

Feral, like most Nightbrothers, was illiterate until he became a tribal leader, alongside Savage. Even now he can barely count past 23.

Feral was born on a leap year. Technically, although he should be 20, he’s only 5 years old. <3

AU: A Galaxy Far Far Away

Feral is never choked by Savage. Instead, he tags along with Obi-Wan and Anakin, is taken to Coruscant and starts a new life as a Republic officer. He becomes friends with Ahsoka and gets along very well with the Clone troopers. He and Rex also happen to fall in love, as well. <3

Feral has a crush on a fellow Nightbrother, Lash, but doesn’t meet him again until the latter becomes a bounty hunter and finds work on Kamino training Clone cadets.

On one occasion, Feral is captured by Separatist spies, frozen in carbonite and transported to the remote system of Tau Cheti. The planet of Tau Prime - located on the edge of Wild Space - is home to a race of hostile bird-like aliens who have a deep hatred for Zabraks.

Feral barely makes it out of there alive. Lash teams up with Rex, Ahsoka and Anakin to rescue him and they succeed! :D

After finding Savage again, Feral stows away on board the ship that takes them to Lotho Minor. He and Savage have a tearful reunion.

When he finds Maul, Feral is horrified, to say the least. He’s even more shaken up when he realises his home world is in ruins. After Maul is healed, Feral is further frightened by his lust for revenge.

After Obi-Wan is captured, poor Feral finds himself torn between his loyalty to his brothers and the Republic. In the lightsaber fight between Jedi and Sith, Feral loses his right hand to Maul’s lightsaber. He would have lost more if he hadn’t escaped with Obi-Wan and Ventress.

Feral later receives a prosthetic hand, but the poor bab is still very upset. He can’t stop thinking about Savage and Maul. During this difficult time, he meets Yoda and discovers that he is Force sensitive like his brothers. Although he is too old to begin Jedi training, Feral gets an idea of what it’s like from Ahsoka.

After having a vision of Savage’s death on Mandalore, Feral travels to the war-torn planet, much against the will of everyone else. There, he tries to persuade Savage to join him and the Republic. However, he is shot by a Death Watch Commando. The shot doesn’t kill him, but he loses consciousness and Savage, grief-stricken, believes he is dead.

Taken back to the Republic by Obi-Wan, Feral remains comatose for a few weeks. When he regains consciousness, he is heartbroken to learn that Savage is dead. He constantly blames himself for not being able to save his brother. Try as they might, neither Rex nor Ahsoka can console him. </3

When Ahsoka travels to Mandalore to fight Maul after leaving the Jedi Order, Feral goes with her and Rex. There, he and Maul fight once again. Maul ignores Feral’s pleas to join him. Feral bravely states that he has no hatred for Maul and forgives him, hoping that they may meet again someday.

Sure enough, Maul and Feral do meet again by the time of the Rebellion. After Maul’s redemption, he joins Feral in Phoenix Squadron. In that same Rebel cell, Feral reunites with Rex, Ahsoka and Lash, who has become an A-Wing pilot.

Feral survives the Battle of Scarif, the Battle of Yavin, the Battle of Hoth AND the battle of Endor! :D He and Rex are overjoyed that the Empire has fallen and they both live peaceful lives.

Feral, Maul and Rex all pass away on the same day. About twelve years before the events of The Force Awakens, all three of them die peacefully in their sleep. (sry if this is too sad)

AU: Legend of the Night Watcher

Feral and Savage both live relatively normal lives on Coruscant, running a small delivery service.

However, Feral dresses up as a vigilante every night and goes to fight crime in the Coruscant underworld, earning himself the alias of the Night Watcher.

Nobody else knows the Night Watcher’s true identity except for Savage and Maul, who is the ruler of Mandalore. Maul is openly proud of Feral, whereas Savage is very protective and wants Feral to be safe, despite his risky job.

Feral is notably more confident and sassy in this AU, but he’s still the cinnamon roll we all know and love. <3

He and Rex are married as well :D

AU: At Home With The Zabrak Brothers

Feral lives a normal suburban life with his brothers and spends his days playing the guitar in the streets, singing Ed Sheeran songs and the like. He hopes to become a professional musician someday. <3

He is obsessed with Luke Skywalker and watches the Original Trilogy on an almost daily basis. He even has the Jedi’s name tattooed onto his abs in Korean script. XD

Feral vapes frequently, mostly just to annoy Maul when he’s reading so he can blow a huge cloud of steam into his face. :D

His relationship with Mother Talzin is shaky, to say the least. She barely even knows his name half the time.

Feral has a red panda plushie named Luke Skywalker, which he sleeps with every single night <3 In addition to his, he still uses a pacifier and Savage reads and/or sings to him at bedtime.

Feral loves Disney movies and listening to trap music. He always sings in the car when he and his bros are travelling somewhere. Savage now has A Whole New World stuck in his head for eternity XD

Feral is addicted to junk food. When Savage bought a giant box of cookies, Feral snuck into the kitchen in the middle of the night and ate them one by one for about three months solid before he was busted.

He once mistook wasabi for guacamole, which eventually led to him and his brothers being thrown out of Itsu.

In this AU, Feral is basically a big kid. He eats messy, is super innocent and loves playing and having a good time.

AU: YouTuber Life

In this AU, Feral and his bros are youtubers, of course :3

Feral has his own solo channel, called Forever Feral. It’s basically a little like dangmattsmith. Video topics include mini-vlogs, reactions, life hack experiments and LEGO Star Wars gameplay. Feral has his plushie with him in every single video :D

He also has a channel that he shares with his brothers, just called The Zabrak Brothers, which has vlogs, Battlefront 2 gameplay and sketch comedies.

Feral has a habit of making cute commentaries on everything and has become famous for his catchphrase: “Sheesh-kebabs!” which he says whenever something dramatic happens.

Ok, that’s all for now, folks. My hands are numb from typing and I need to rest. But I hope you all enjoy these. MTFBWY <3

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doorsclosingslowly · 7 years

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Bring Our Curses Home

Out of every defeat, the means of the next victory can be fashioned. When Darth Maul gets abducted by a large zabrak that calls him Brother, he knows he is meant to train him, and it'll take the better part of a year until he'll realize that his new-found apprentice is just a fragile thing held together by regret and love and sinew.

(The shock might even make him grow as a person.)

7.5k | companion piece to Thank You But Your Princess Is In Another Castle | read on AO3

(When he was very very little—when was just a tiny bit smaller than he is today, Savage will later tease in his irritatingly affectionate way—when he was just a young child, he believed that he was forged by darkness, and that in the lines on his face, evil secrets were written that everyone but him could read.

It wasn’t pride that made him think this. Not exclusively, at least.

It was childhood naïveté, and bone-deep belief in his Master, and a few words taken too literally. It was people staring at his patterned face and scabby bruised arms when he sneaked outside. It was the Jedi he saw, who wanted to take him away for his bright yellow eyes, and it was the friendly smiles aimed at his Master. It was the people in the instructional holovids his Master left him, all hornless in shades of brown and pink—all human.

It was holonet articles on family structures, and new words for concepts he had never even considered. Mother. Brother.

A person would have them, he’d believed.

Maul had neither, and no need for them: He was a tool of the dark side, welded and marked and named after his function.

It was a med-droid that dispelled the idea. Dirk, round and impatient and to be scrapped thirteen days later for programming bugs and lenience, had taken a routine test, and the word ‘zabrak’ flashed up on his screen. Maul looked it up, and touched his head in confusion—no hair. Then, he saw the section about Dathomir, the huts and the breeding and barbarous, repeated again and again.

He’d been so grateful that his Master had taken him away and trained him in the ways of the Sith, then. He will be their instrument of revenge.

Despite his origins, Maul is destined for greatness.)

Darth Maul wakes up, and at first, there is no reason to suspect that today begins the long confusing rest of his life. He is prone on some sort of soft, rumpled surface—not the usual way he sleeps, curled up and wrapping his head in his arms in some obsolete instinct for protection. Not actually an impossibility though, he thinks, especially when his eyes snap open, and his arms try to stretch. They don’t move. He didn’t lie down here. He is tied up on a bed in an unfamiliar cargo hold, a pounding emptiness in his mind and scabs itching on his skull.

I’ve already mastered this test, Maul thinks.

He doesn’t voice his petulance—it is his Master’s prerogative to train him as He sees fit, and it does not matter that Maul already spent two months deprived of the force back when he was stationed in the facility on Mustafar. It doesn’t matter that Maul would have beaten the current galactic record of time spent immobile in a sensory deprivation tank by eighteen days if only he’d called the Thuris Book of Records. (He’s checked.)

He looks around and notices that there is someone else here with him, a hulking figure crouched in a corner and surrounded by the rustling of plastic containers. The being is almost certainly Maul’s attacker, though he hadn’t taken a good look at who entered his home before jumping into the fight. There was only the knowledge that this wasn’t Lord Sidious, and no-one but his Master would know of the room. That, and the memory of countless assassin droids randomly activating themselves at night.

Not looking properly was a mistake unworthy of any fighter, let alone a Sith apprentice, and now, he is paying for it.

Judging by their back, the attacker isn’t someone Maul recognizes. Not his Master’s usual muscle, not one of the mercenaries He still keeps around even though there is no need for them anymore, now that Lord Sidious has Maul.

The other person’s head is yellow-black, and bald, and horned.

“Brother,” the zabrak says when he turns around.

Maul had braced himself for trickery and pain the moment he became conscious of his failure. And yet, the word drives its teeth into the still-soft flesh of his belly. Brother, so unfamiliar and sharp and wonderful.

Brother.

“You are the brother I’ve been searching for. Brother, I have found you. I’ll bring you back home to Dathomir. Mother Talzin is waiting for you,” the kidnap—his brother tells him, but Maul doesn’t listen very closely. There is so much to think about.

Brother, his hearts beat. Brother, brother.

This is his kin. Flesh of his flesh. Maul did not come from nothing, after all.

This is… He flinches. This is a trick. A test of loyalty. Maul has given his Master everything, and yet, He thinks he’ll trade his station for the first flea-bitten savage that crosses his path. He thinks Maul might leave his apprenticeship behind, the grand plans of the Sith. The life of dedication. Everything. For this?!

The lying zabrak walks closer, and then he kneels before Maul—he is so big that he has to, that bending doesn’t suffice for reaching Maul even though the bed isn’t particularly low—and his eyes are on the ropes. He’s within striking range, unconcerned, as if Maul doesn’t pose a danger at all just because he’s tied up.

The disregard burns, but the betrayal—did he really believe this man is his brother—the betrayal hurts more, and the knowledge he never should have cared in the first place.

Livid and quicker than a whip-snake, Maul bites down on the index finger of his Master’s new tool. There’s a crack and then another—Maul’s teeth weren’t made for this much pressure—and the attacker gives a satisfying cry of pain. Let Him never underestimate me again, Maul thinks as his mouth floods with the familiar copper taste of blood.

He spits the meat and tooth-splinter back out, narrowly missing the other zabrak, who is scrambling backwards until he hits the wall. This weakling is the man Master sent to test Maul?

“No! Wait, brother,” the kidnapper whimpers. Then, with slightly more strength: “Do you remember who you are, where you came from?”

“I am apprentice to the most powerful being in the galaxy,” Maul hisses.

“Sorry.”

(Later, he’ll realize: If this had been a test, he would be dead now. He’d deserve it. With those eleven prideful words, he risked betraying his Master’s plan and the premature reveal of the Sith, and the end of everything he’s ever held dear.)

Maul is tired of this charade. “Unhand me now,” he orders.

“I’m sorry, brother. The Mother wants to talk to you,” the impostor repeats, as if he thinks that Maul is a simple beast who hasn’t yet seen through his Master’s test. (As if Maul even had a mother who cares.)

Detecting the plot will evidently not be enough for his Master. He’s probably instructed the zabrak to play along until his very end. Maybe He’s even made him believe the lie—Lord Sidious can spin magic with words that Maul hasn’t yet learned to understand, let alone perform himself.

No, his Master wants Maul to fight.

The force-suppressant is wrought strong, though, and with all his concentration he cannot find a way to slip out, neither with the dark side nor by dislocating any fingers to slip the knot at the wrists. It is much more powerful than the collar he wore for months on Mustafar.

He looks up again and catches the zabrak watching him. The pretend brother wears a joyful grin, but that means nothing: His Master has always had the kindliest smiles. Let him gloat, then. Let him bask in his victory over Maul, and let the pain come. Someday soon the kidnapper will make a mistake, and Maul will bring Lord Sidous his head.

After a few minutes, the messaging console starts beeping, and Maul flinches. Does his Master expect a report of Maul’s victory already?

The kidnapper doesn’t take the call and seal Maul’s fate, though.

He just freezes. He stares at Maul’s face as if he is seeing someone else entirely, someone dead. Then, he types something on the navcomputer’s keypad—coordinates, Maul suspects. But where to? Unless he’s been unconscious for long enough that they might have already left Coruscant, which admittedly is a possibility with the ghost of vomit in his mouth and the way his head throbs, his Master is already here.

The console beeps again, insistent, and with one last look at Maul and no grimace of pain on his face, the yellow zabrak drives his massive fist through the transparisteel and metal as easily as if he was crushing an enemy’s head.

“Stay here, Maul,” he says. “Don’t worry. I won’t let you die like—She will never ever take you from me.”

Dimly, Maul begins to consider the possibility that sending this man for his kidnapping wasn’t a plan.

It was a miscalculation.

The ropes are still wrapped around his arms a month later, and his Master is not coming for him.

(Maul had spent his life alone, punctured by brief visits from his Master and long stretches of time in which movement—the dance of a fight to the death, or the rigorous sequence of training—had obliterated the need for conscious thought. There had been stillness as well, though, and an unmoving body breeds precipitance of mind.

He’d considered many things in those idle moments, and occasionally, his thoughts had extended to that nebulous time after.

After victory.

After his Master.

He’d braved those vertiginous thoughts sometimes, with a small measure of excitement. How it would come to pass he’d ascend the hierarchy, he hadn’t considered—his Master is eternal and strong and thinking of His death feels like blasphemy—but the power that he believed he was being groomed for called out.

One day, it would be his turn to carry on the sacred traditions of the Sith. He’d be the keeper of their knowledge, of the strength that arises from pain and despair and hatred. The day would come when the qotsisajak would leave his mouth and enter the ear of his chosen successor, who will in turn hand it down and say once more, Peace is a lie. There is only passion.

A master without an apprentice is nothing.

Choosing that apprentice would take careful planning.

He wouldn’t take a child, he’d decided. He wouldn’t have the patience for all that crying, for the feeble whimpering hunger as baby fat melts into bones and muscle. He’d get angry at the way stubbly red fingers waste his time when they grab for his hand every time he comes by, desperate for any touch—tiny hands flinching from the sizzling charcoal smell of the blade, and then reaching out again. It would take years until they stop flinching, he’d remembered. It would take even longer until they stop reaching out.

He could always shut the child away, he’d known, but would he remember to drop off ration bars and beverages? He’d probably come back to a shrivelled corpse and feel glad to be rid of it. Its death would be unearned mercy. And before that, he’d know it’s there, weak and losing water-weight by the hour.

No, a child apprentice wouldn’t do—)

But then, another option drops into his life, wrapping his oversized yellow arms around Maul’s neck and refusing to let go.

It was not Maul’s plan, to take an apprentice now.

He still has much to learn, manipulations and enticements and everything his Master prefers to use—but an opportunity like this, an apprentice like this, will never come to him again. If he will ever attempt to eclipse his Master… If he will ever rise up and slay Him and prove to Lord Sidious that He was wise in selecting Maul as his successor, of all the wretched children of Dathomir, it has to be now, when his own chosen apprentice is still alive.

It is not a slight that Lord Sidious has not been searching for Maul, he realizes. It is a new kind of order: Be hungry, apprentice Mine, and devour Me.

If he contacts Him, Maul will fail his Master, and Savage will die. His thoughts skitter over the shape of what Sidious has in store for men who dare take His possessions. He doesn’t think deeply of the wrath, or of his brother’s face caught in the rictus of agony. (It allows him to believe that his justifications are dispassionate, and that his foremost loyalty is still to the Sith order.)

“Brother, guess what I found,” Savage shouts into the Sheathipede’s belly, where Maul has spent his afternoon working on fine-tuning the motivator. The ship was so woefully maintained when he commandeered it two weeks ago that even the week-long overhaul was only able to achieve so much. Whoever could have thought it was a good idea to give a shuttle of his own to Maul’s unwieldy brother—brother! The word is still new in the grooves of his mind. Yes, the shuttle is flying smoothly already, but Maul has standards.

Savage would only have been in the way, so after their frustrating training session this morning, he’d been sent away to go have fun or whatever it is he does when Maul’s not watching.

(It’s not that Savage was completely bereft of promise as an apprentice. He could clearly fight, at least, even though his kicks and punches were much less fluid than Maul would have liked, and he was unfamiliar with the most elementary of katas. He did know how to use the staff Maul had him whittle from one the scarce skeletal trees—the saberstaff, alas, still lies somewhere in the LiMerge building, and Maul will have to gather materials soon.

There was possibility in Savage, up until the point Maul tried to goad him into an imprudent attack by leaving his left side open slightly. Not such an amateur move that someone with Savage’s skill should have seen the trap, but still an obvious exploitable ‘mistake’.

His apprentice hadn’t attacked, though.

The staff had clattered from his hands, decimeters away from impact with Maul’s skull. His eyes had grown glassy and the air had howled out of his mouth for minutes.

When poking him with his own staff hadn’t produced any results, Maul had guided him to sit on the floor, and just watched for a while until intelligence slowly returned to Savage’s eyes. Eventually, he’d let him walk the twenty kilometres to Meirm City to calm down his emotions. Training is supposed to produce passion, and Maul would have known how to use the icy fear he’d sensed in his brother. But Savage is still a beginner in the dark arts of the Sith.)

Now Savage is back, and he’s holding out a rusty device for Maul’s inspection. It’s a portable gas cooker.

Maul raises an eyebrow, unwilling to be infected by Savage’s obvious pride.

“I had to search for a while,” Savage says, “because no self-respecting weequay would ruin their food by boiling it. They’ve got taste buds, you know. But I found something to stop you complaining about my cooking every single day!”

It’s not a function of apprentices Maul that has ever had cause to consider before, but maybe he can grow to appreciate it. Savage certainly seems to think it matters. He spends hours preparing food every day, and then he pesters Maul with questions about preferences he has never before had the luxury of noticing. Getting meat prepared to his specifications instead of the uncooked spicy trash Savage forced down his throat for two months is nice.

And next time, he’ll get Savage to bring back Maul’s favorite flavour of protein bar.

They sleep in the same room, now.

At first, they didn’t—in the beginning, they spent every second together, Maul cuffed and glowering on the bed and Savage refusing to let him out of sight, creaking and groaning away the nights on a chair just out of reach. Maul had taken what meagre satisfaction there was to be had, in those months of failure, from the knowledge that the unwanted chivalry gave his captor a constant sleep-deprivation headache, and a crick in the neck that just wouldn’t go away.

Maul didn’t sleep well either, on the bed. Too soft. Too unfamiliar. It was still worth it.

(In an even earlier beginning, they’d shared. Savage had owned an adult bed, much too big for two children—let alone seven-year-old Savage on his own. When he’d been handed a new colicky baby, he’d quickly figured out that this way, he didn’t have to get out from under the blankets to comfort his little brother.)

When Maul asserted control over the shuttle and their relationship, he made Savage leave every night. It was a simple decision: He has never shared space with another being. Neither has his old Master, he is quite sure. It is the nature of the Sith. They are alone—“Hello,” Maul had said to a lizard once, then watched it be electrocuted and learned a valuable lesson—and they don’t trust anyone, least of all their apprentice.

It wasn’t pity that made Maul allow him back inside, thirty-four nights later.

It was not his problem that the Sheathipede only has two heated rooms, the small cockpit and the cargo hold with its assortment of space heaters. It wasn’t his problem that Savage has put dents in the cockpit ceiling with his horns—that he barely fits into the pilot seat, and certainly couldn’t sleep well there, judging by the way he tended to wander around at night. He’s a big, lumbering thing. He may have tried, but still his feet pounded the durasteel floor, and so Maul woke for the first, second and fifth time every night to a worried brother bent over the floor in the cargo hold’s corner that Maul had claimed as his bed.

It wasn’t any of those things, in the end.

It was the yawning.

(They’d been stopping on a fleck in Hutt space called Tatooine. The suns had shone brightly through the cockpit’s transparisteel side, and Maul had been imagining himself as a Sith Lord triumphant, as one does in an idle moment. He’d been fighting the Grand Master of the Jedi in in a duel that drove both of them to the limits of their endurance. Maul had had the edge, though. Soon, he would have cut him down—in his mind, he is always slightly better.

He’d seen himself, ‘saber raised for the penultimate strike. His mind had fleshed out the scene and added Maul’s apprentice, mouth open in the semi-permanent gape of sleep deprivation.

And then, he’d given up.)

So they sleep in the same room now, and it’s annoyance, not shock, that makes Maul pry a pillow out of the walls of his nest and aim it at the whimpering heap on the bed. “No, brother,” Savage is moaning, over and over and over. “Brother, no, I won’t kill you, brother, no, no—”

Maul’s pillow hits true.

It impales itself on one of Savage’s horns, but he’s barely distracted from fighting his unknown enemy. His eyes are blank.

“Kill me, apprentice? You’re welcome to try,” Maul adds, in a loud and deliberate voice.

Savage’s head shoots up, as if he had just noticed Maul’s existence, and then he keeps staring. He raises his hands—chewed on, again, Maul notices. He wonders how Savage could have escaped into the world so clearly unfinished. This is the kind of action that’s trained out of children very young. (He doesn’t even remember the biting, just the bitter poison coating his fingertips and the vomit that followed.)

He keeps his body taut and immobile for a while and waits, his eyes trained on Savage’s—they reflect the scarce light back at him, and then it rebounds from Maul’s irises in turn, he imagines, like in that ball game he wasn’t supposed to watch. A hall of mirrors of red-yellow fibrovascular tissue and water. A pair of eyes, so identical to Maul’s own and yet so scared. Weak.

Savage doesn’t move either, apart from his heaving chest, and Maul doesn’t think about how his staring isn’t really a display of dominance, not anymore. It’s an anchor.

Slowly, his brother’s heartbeats wither into a dull pitter-patter, and Savage closes his eyes again.

This is why this strange man searches out my company, Maul thinks. This is what comforts my brother. Maul is superior to him—apart from that one embarrassing first meeting—superior in every way, and Savage could never hope to fight back. This apprentice will never surpass the master. This brother will never cut his own flesh.

Quickly, Maul discards the thought again. It doesn’t make any sense: Nobody would trust the one best placed to hurt them, his Master has told him.

And as in all things, He is right.

One night, he catches Savage putting a small bowl filled with some kind of waterfowl meat into the cupboard.

(They have always been there, these bowls. Maul disposes of them each morning, quickly heating them and gulping them down. They contain barely one bite’s worth of food. His brother is evidently a wasteful eater, always putting good things out of sight and leaving them to spoil. He should really make Savage wash the bowls himself and stop covering for his brother’s disgusting untidiness.

The first one, he’d smelled when he was still shackled, something sweetly rotten from far overhead.)

“What are you doing?” Maul asks flatly. Now, he realizes that it doesn’t look like slowness of mind: This is intentional.

Savage smiles at him. “A mournful offering,” he says, an odd cadence in his voice. “An improvised offering. We usually leave them out some miles off the village, protected from vermin by wooden trellises. As the body in the ground rots, so does the meat, and our feelings with it.”

“How wasteful,” Maul says. What’s dead is dead, and food is food. There is no point in giving a useless weak corpse anything more than it deserves. He is glad that he’s been eating them.

“You are supposed to go hungry after a death,” Savage explains slowly, as if to a small child. “Your thoughts will… It—helps. When the offering is gone, so is our pain. It doesn’t work as well, apparently, out here in space. Everything is too sterile.” He swallows. “Here, you’re hungry. Eat. You can have it,” Savage says, and he holds out the bowl toward Maul.

“Raw meat is inedible,” Maul protests, even though he was going to eat it five minutes ago. Then he peers inside and hisses, “And there is blood in this.”

“Of course. It’s a red-hand mourning.”

The words mean nothing to him, and most likely not to anyone else in the—civilized—world, either, something Savage tends to forget. He is an odd man, often speaking in paraphasias and then looking heartbroken when Maul doesn’t respond. It’s sad. However, mental weakness is not to be indulged—Maul babbled sometimes, as the holonet would later tell him young children are wont to do, and so Master held lightning against his face until he was still—and Maul only stares at him.

Savage looks away. “It’s my blood,” he says. “It means murder. I killed him.”

“You killed someone?” Maul is reluctantly surprised. Despite his early promise, Savage has never shown any great aptitude for fighting. Maul has always beaten him easily, even rusty as he was after two trainingless months. Savage never puts up a good fight when he wrestles him out of the good sun-bathing spots, or really defends himself at all. He just rolls over when Maul presses his hands against his throat, and lets his belly rumble with laughter.

Now, Maul tentatively revises his impression: Savage is possibly not as weak as he looks. Maybe he’s just had an off day—a lot of off days. Maybe it will be possible to forge something worthwhile out of his new apprentice yet.

“I did,” Savage replies, and then he sets the offering-bowl on the table and turns to walk out of the kitchen. “Oh brother have mercy, I did.”

(A year later, Savage will bandage the torn stump of Maul’s leg, and he’ll whisper something, a hypnotic staccato rhythm. At first, it’ll appear to be a feeble attempt self-calming, as close to meditation as Savage has ever gotten, but then he’ll look up at Maul and explain, “This is an old cradle-song. I sang it for—”

Maul will chew through the last remaining dregs of his patience. “I don’t know it,” he’ll snarl.

Savage will attempt to defend himself. “I know, brother,” he’ll say. “I know. I wasn’t—I forget sometimes. We are together now, and it’s right, it’s so… And then you look at me, all confused. And I remember. I remember a sadist bought my baby brother and it took me twenty years to get him back.”

Maul will be so uncomfortable he won’t complain again for months.

Secretly, he’ll suspect that that was the reason why Savage shared his thoughts in the first place.)

Savage uses his bare hands to crush the head of a trandoshan who aims his rifle at Maul.

The qualms about his suitability have long been forgotten by then—have been wilfully suppressed—and Maul doesn’t notice at all that it isn’t squeamishness that stops Savage, but something even more alien: This here is the only person in the world who has ever thought that Maul needs protection and care.

They’re in a decrepit hangar somewhere deep in the ecumenopolis of Nar Shaddaa, and Maul is thinking of home. It’s a moment of weakness. It’s just the rats skittering through the empty space. It’s the light of a distant sun filtering through a tiny window, almost blotted out by the ever-present smoke, calling to Maul, Climb! Climb! Up there, you will see the sunrise. It’s a corner filled with rags and scribbled-on flimsi and some kind of mechanical project. Everything’s covered in dust: The homeless owner must have left everything behind. Maybe they got dragged onto a cruiser, never to be seen again. Maybe they’re enjoying the adventure. Maybe their carcass is rotting in a cellar somewhere.

He shakes his head to dispel the thoughts.

There is a job to do.

He is here, today, because Savage dragged him along. He’d been excited, his brother, talking about his contacts. Talking about his business, hauling goods and victual and contraband across the galaxy. Maul had tried to explain that they are Sith, that smuggling is below their dignity, but it hadn’t dimmed the light in Savage’s eyes and only fomented Savage’s protestations. Eventually, Maul had conceded to the more important goal of making him shut up, even if it meant going along to pick up the cargo.

Savage’s contact is a human small-time robber, flanked by a dozen more members of his species armed with vibroshivs.

Good, Maul thinks, taking in the way their eyes narrow disdainfully when the brothers walk in. At least they’re armed. If they hadn’t even assigned a minimal threat level to Savage after their past interactions, he would really need to have some firm words with his apprentice.

Maybe he’ll have them anyway, because when the human offers three hundred credits for two not-to-be opened crates to be brought to the inner rim planet Denon, Savage appears to want to shake his hand.

The human scum grins.

Maul reaches for Savage’s hand. He finds the index finger, the left one—the one Maul hasn’t yet bitten off—and now he bends it backwards until Savage cries out, and stops moving.

Then, he steps forward and says, “I am afraid that all transport fees have increased by twelve-hundred percent. It’s such a dangerous business nowadays. There are too many crews out there who would take the cargo for themselves and slit their client’s throat.” He pauses for effect and raises one eyebrow. “I’m sure you agree that finding an honest delivery service is worth the fee.”

In the resulting fight, he cuts through the gang with ease, and it’s been a long time since he has felt so happy.

(“I understand that there was no need for money on Dathomir,” Maul will reply when Savage complains later. “I understand that this is a new world for you...”

I was protecting you, he doesn’t say. He isn’t sure that it would be true, anyway.

“We have to be on guard. They will assume that every zabrak is a stupid beast, and we will not confirm it. If you want to keep playing those games, apprentice, you will comport yourself in a dignified way. No true Sith would allow themselves to be ripped off like that.”

He won’t admit that he doesn’t really know what exactly three hundred credits can buy, either. The offer had just seemed like a low sum, considering his former Master had always talked about billions whenever he’d mentioned money.)

Two days later, Savage is swaddled on his bed with a broken-off side horn and most of Maul’s blankets, a pouch of surface ice he’d told Maul to scratch up held against his head. There is no more training today, because apparently, this is the kind of injury that, if it had struck Savage’s brother, would be cause for week-long observation and pampering.

“Let’s try again tomorrow,” he’d told Maul. “And come in every hour and wake me up. Can’t sleep. It could be a concussion,” like an oafish—

He is being uncharitable, Maul notices.

Yes, Savage is weak… but does Maul blame his beloved speederbike—did, Maul corrects himself, it is gone now, still hidden on the LiMerge’s uppermost level unless some low-life has stolen it—did he blame it when the ignition didn’t start right, or the steering veered slightly to the left? No. He worked. He pared it down to its core mechanics when he couldn’t repair the fault otherwise, and didn’t pause to sleep or eat until it was better.

The fault lies within Maul alone. He has been indulging himself, every time he throws the staff at Savage and shows him a new style of parrying, a better evasive manoeuvre. Every time he takes a bite of Savage’s cooking.

Every time he shies away from sharing his Master’s training with his brother, he fails their lineage.

Every second he does not spend starving the light in Savage’s eyes, so that it has nothing left to consume but the weakness that still lives within his brother’s bones… and for what, the craven selfish fear that one day, Savage might not be happy to see him, anymore? The feeling of dry callused hands stroking the base of his horns at night? He’s been taught better than that.

He has fashioned Savage into an enjoyable sparring partner, a laughing man, a capable smuggler and bounty hunter—an equal. Not a Sith.

He has failed his brother.

Maul has grown used to the soft background hum of his brother’s emotions. It is just there, like a moderately annoying small-fly—always hovering around, seeking to bite Maul and infect him with its backwash. There is warmth, yes, there’s boiling rage and fear and coziness, and sometimes, when Maul is complaining about the quality of Savage’s food or when they come out of hyperspace a day early because Maul has reset the navcomputer and he’s laughing at Savage’s confusion, there’ll be the flash of a patterned orange face in the corner of his eye and the bitter alien taste of shame and sorrow in his mouth. Beneath it all, there is all-consuming love. Devotion, clinging to everything like tacky blood and just as impossible to scrub off.

Even now, when Maul has stormed into the room holding their beds, seconds after his revelation, and ordered Savage to get up and receive his first true lesson as a Sith apprentice, it is there.

Even now, in this elementary lesson of strangulation and near-death and terror—a lesson he’d first received when he barely reached up to his Master’s hip—when Maul’s fingers ring his brothers neck and try to wring all the air out and the weakness with it, and awaken the glimmer of power that he is sure lives within Savage’s flesh. He is showing him to reach for the might of the dark side, which rears up out of agony and gives survival and unimaginable strength. Anger is an energy.

And even now, he feels his brother’s mind and the love in it, diluting the pain and the slow white slide of Savage’s terror and the euphoria that inevitably follows air-loss.

His presence is just there, faithful and eternal—

Or so Maul had thought.

Savage’s eyes roll with the pressure, and the pulse under Maul’s hands stutters for the fraction of a second. In surprise, he lets go.

The swirling hum that is Savage flickers, and then it rears up in a deafening miasma of another time, with hands that are not his and I am your kin, do not do this and terrible pressure, and blood under Maul’s fingernails that isn’t there. The suffocating pain that follows isn’t Maul’s, but it is as powerful as any hate he has ever turned to, and he knows: This is it.

This is the moment when his apprentice becomes a true Sith.

And then, impossibly, the pain dies. Where the solid mental presence of his brother used to be, there is only an absence: a hole, the loss of a sense as profound as touch or sight. A sense of serenity, of acceptance.

Maul’s hands vibrate. There is no pulse under them that he can feel.

He feels its lack as if he was rent in two.

“Brother,” he whispers. “Brother.”

There is no answer.

It cannot be. Savage is not weak. His brother is not this weak. There was potential, Maul has seen it! It was just going to take a little less coddling—he was just going to teach him with his Master’s lessons, also—he was just going to… Maul has been asphyxiated, and it made him stronger! It made him a Sith! It didn’t make him—

He’s still cradling his brother’s head, but his eyes are too dull now to look at it.

There is no movement: He does not notice the gasps, the desperate sucking-in of air.

There is only agony—implacable, indomitable, inexorable.

There is no movement.

There is more than he has ever felt. A swirling kaleidoscope fills him to the brim and bursts the durasteel walls of the shuttle. There is no space for air when he opens his heart, no space for anything anymore but fear—more fear than he could ever manage to feel for himself even in his youngest moments—and grim determination.

Until recently, Maul’s whole life had been at the disposal of his Master. No matter how much he loved his speeder bike, how often he polished it, or the years he had spent refining his saberstaff, he had always known they weren’t really his. His body has always been an instrument wielded by another’s will.

He has never owned anything before.

He will not relinquish his brother. Not to the dark side. Not to death. Not to anything. Not anymore.

But it is too late.

There is nothing left in Maul’s world but this knowledge, and his fingers, too heavy to feel, and the skull they hold.

They hold it, and it is still, and then it is squirming with a hacking cough that joins the rushing in Maul’s ears so easily that it might as well belong to a ghost. There is movement, and then his arms are being repositioned, like a shut-off droid’s, and he is pulled upwards, and then, eventually—

There is a gentle hand stroking his horns.

“I have failed you, brother. I am an unworthy master. I’m not like—I couldn’t—”

“Shhhh, Maul,” Savage whispers hoarsely, and he does not react to the horror Maul has become, kneeling on the bed and wracked with weakness and pouring hot salt from his eyes. He only takes his brother’s hand and clutches it closely against his chest, and he sings the cradle-song.

They’ve been on Bespin for a while now, and the ring of bruises around Savage’s throat—never truly visible through the black markings in the first place—has faded. They’re trying to meet up with a frankly inconsiderate client. It’s the kind of trip that was only supposed to last a single day, at the behest of a squirrely chadra-fan who’s too paranoid to send the data on their target via holonet.

Today, she showed up. She’s three weeks late, and she won’t even agree to Maul’s entirely reasonable demand that she triple the fee, as compensation for her tardiness.

Instead of the stalker she wants rid of, it’s her own head that’s bouncing across the dirty floor.

Maul still has his newly built saberstaff out when someone shouts at them, “Savage? Savage Opress!”

Twi’lek. Bartender. Female. Yellow and short, mid-forties probably, no dress sense that Maul can make out. Slight limp, bad hip. There is a Free Ryloth flag behind her, pinned to the wall behind the bar, and her bare shoulders are covered with the scars left behind by interrogation. Ten different ways to take her down, and three in which she might pose a danger despite her ailments. That’s what Maul registers, and then he realizes he remembers her. (Maul’s got a decent memory for faces, not that it has ever served his purposes. In his life, seeing someone again after years will only ever mean one thing: That he didn’t stab hard enough, the first time.)

A job for his old Master, less than a year before his life changed irrevocably. She was a bystander, a terrified victim hiding behind a bar counter. There’d been the stench of alcohol on her breath, and the distinct possibility she wouldn’t even remember his visage, and so he’d judged her unworthy of elimination.

“I was wonderin’ whether you’d show up again. And this is the beloved missing brother, I’m assumin’?” She grins conspiratorially at Maul, and she isn’t put off by his unimpressed glare, or the stench of lightsaber-charred meat that was in his robes for two days after their first meeting. That’s in his clothes now. The only good thing to come of this... situation is the confirmation that he was right: She was too inebriated and oblivious to bother killing.

She isn’t drunk now, or maybe she just doesn’t smell like it.

No matter.

What’s important is the way she raises her arms and attempts to touch Savage.

Maul raises his ‘saber again. He barely restrains himself, even after realizing that Savage isn’t cowering or apprehensive. There is not even the new, instinctive flinch that has slowly grown smaller over the past few weeks. His brother is refusing the hug, offering a handshake instead, and that warning didn’t come from the force after all—no, it’s just Maul’s twin hearts beating with the suspicion that here is someone who wants his most precious possession for herself.

She only wants a loan, it turns out.

An evening in Savage’s company, sitting at the bar counter and drinking from foul-smelling bottles. They talk about this and that and Maul’s alleged snoring, and then someone called Feral, with decreasing levels of grammatical correctness.

Maul does not ask. He glowers all the approaching customers away, and the beings that approach him with beer coasters scrawled with unfamiliar number-code. It’s not that he wouldn’t prefer taking a new mission right now, after the current one ended with a disappointing lack of fighting. He just needs to prevent his apprentice being led astray more.

(He doesn’t think anymore, I am the master now. I could make him leave.)

Thirteen hours later, Savage’s twi’lek acquaintance is still shouting about the Galactic Food and Drug Administration’s recent regulations on accarrgm. “Pure discrimination, is what it is!” she complains. “They wanna ban it just because some humans had a sip too much and died of alcohol poisoning? Let’s give a geonosian a bottle of Corellian ale and see what happens, but noooo. Course not. Kriffin’ humans. Do you know how many credits I’ve lost because I’ve had to say, no, sorry, we’re out of stock? Kashyyyk should sue! Not that it would help any because the karking courts are stacked against us, but...”

Savage vociferously agrees. Maul rolls his eyes—his brother may or may not have been even capable of understanding what she’s talking about, about fifteen shot glasses ago.

“They think they’re the bosses—they think they own us, fuckin’ slavers. Any luck and they’ll get what’s coming to them, soon...”

The only reason Maul is even listening with half an ear is because there is nothing else worth hearing in the bar.

His eyes are blinking sleepily at the vidscreen in the corner, which is showing reruns of Onderon’s last swoop bike race season with the sound turned off. He’s just felt his way into the rhythm of the race and predicted that in one or two seconds, current champion Nkh will crash her bike into the railings—maybe he should find someone to bet with—when the screen changes into a red-white swirling mass of dots. The galaxy turning, revolving around Coruscant.

It’s the early morning broadcast of Realtime News.

As soon as Maul’s identified the topic of the first bulletin, he snarls at his companions, “Shut up.” This is important.

There is a blockade-breaking cruiser being pulverized on the screen.

Then, it’s showing a painted girl that’s familiar from a recent mission dossier, with heavy robes and heavier words. The Nubian child queen, telling the galaxy—or those parts of it that have no excitement in their lives and are reduced to sitting in a bar and watching holonet newscasts—telling everybody of her planet’s invasion and begging for help.

Next—Maul recalls his Master’s remarks on journalists’ love for balance and fairness, and his smile—next there is Viceroy Nute Gunray of the Trade Federation, condemning Naboo’s decisions in the trade dispute and justifying his actions as self-defense. Beside him, there is an empty spot: He still hasn’t found a replacement for Deputy Hath Monchar, the coward who’d have sold evidence of the plot to the next available bidder and destroyed everything if Maul hadn’t stopped him.

It has begun.

There is no need for a successor, for another link in Bane’s lineage, now.

The first domino stone in Sidous’ plan to assume control of the galaxy has fallen—the plot that required the surrender of Maul’s childhood and that saw him beaten and delirious with vomit, the altar upon which he’d happily butchered his brother’s body and affection—and here he is on this momentous occasion, being ranted at by a human-hating alien separatist, in this dinghy bar full of down-on their-luck outcasts hoping to make a quick buck on a remote mining colony.

Here, in this sticky uncomfortable seat, nursing a glass of virgin blumfruit daiquiri stuffed so full with ice cubes it makes his teeth burn, sits the former Darth Maul.

The thousand-year-old plot of the Sith has started to unfurl, and he is parsecs away.

He was never necessary, after all.

“Hey, Maul,” Socvumo’s throaty voice cuts into his dejection, an inch from his right ear. “I think your bro’s had a little too much now.”

She’s right, and just in time. Maul manages to grab Savage by the horns before his head slides fully off the table.

“You got a safe place for him to sleep it off?”

Maul nods at her, and tries to lay the enormous floppy form of his inebriated brother across his shoulders. Savage’s head hits the table with a dull thud when he stands up. Quickly, he touches the skull to check whether anything’s broken off, and tries again. It’s no use, though: Maul attempts to walk to the door, but he can barely stand with the weight on his back.

He’ll have to drag his brother back to the Sheathipede—drag him home.

This is his life now.

(“Maul,” Savage had whispered a lifetime ago. Maul. A good, strong name. A blessing to scare away the ghosts. A talisman and prayer to keep the baby clothed in the warm mantle of darkness—a name to keep him hidden from beasts and despair and maybe, hopefully, please, also from the pale grasping fingers that haunt every nightbrother’s dream: A name to keep his brother safe and angry and free.

Savage had said it again—and will forever until it wears out his vocal chords, “Maul,” his lips wrapping around the syllable with love and awe.

He’d carefully supported the baby’s head and delighted in the way the little horn-nubs pressed against his skin. The child had gnawed on his fingertips with his tiny toothless jaws, and Savage had known there would be never anything more important in his life.

There would be no pain he wouldn’t suffer to keep his brother by his side.)

#darth maul #maul #savage opress #considerng that apparently i'm choosing to write things with a smaller and smaller potential audience #writing this much cognitive dissonance was fun tho #also having a half-cut off past scene in the beginning isn't aesthetic but it's too late now and it was thematically fitting so idc #dimtraces makes things #star wars

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