Chapter Text
Death wore a familiar face. Age and tragedy had carved lines into his skin, like tattoos that he and his brothers had inked into their own, yet he instead of satisfaction the only thing Maul could feel from his ge’sol . Kenobi was a Force. Was Power. Was the stick to measure his own growth against.
And the both of them had fallen so far from what they could have been. Should have been. Kenobi cradled him like the child he had never been. But Kenobi had reason, the true Chosen One. Not the experiment that was even less living than Maul at his worst. Moonlight reflected off of Kenobi’s hair, a hazy halo of silver, and Maul could see it. So close to the Force, slipping away in Death’s embrace, he gasped at the irony and the beauty and if he’d had the strength he would have laughed.
Instead, “He will avenge us.”
The Force shall free me.
And so Maul passed into the Force, into the knowledge that the Empire the Sith built would fall. Kenobi would see to it.
But Maul was not a creature of peace. His life had been one of trials, of reaching for anything and everything he might learn or use to give him an edge over his enemies and bring his goals closer. His studies had once allowed him to survive on pure, distilled rage despite the loss of his lower limbs. The Force boiled, and Maul woke cold and alone and - terrified.
He sucked in a breath, strangely unlabored, and rolled off the hard surface that the claws of his insanity recognized as a bed.
What Haran is this?
“No.” Maul growled his denial as a voice that sounded like Sidious sneered in the back of his mind. His horns, his too small he was toosmalleverythingwaswrong itched as a forgotten attention drifted toward him. Began crawling into his awareness like a spider coated in noxious oil. “Not again.”
Maul reached out. With the Mastery that had once gotten him his Master’s attention, as brief and painful as it had been, he reached out with one hand and squeezed tiny red fingers into a fist. Metal screeched, bending under unseen pressure as he strangled the bond to his once Master. Blood dripped from his nose. Snarling, Maul jerked his arm back, pulling that poisoned connection out as the crumpled door that had kept him trapped as much as it had kept him safe (lies, the Sith lie) flew past Maul to embed itself in the wall behind him.
Shuddering, smiling, Maul ignored the destruction around him in favor of admiring his wiggling toes.
He had toes.
Grinning, Maul stepped out the hole he had made. With arms crossed leisurely behind his back he headed for the small hanger bay attached to the Palpatine Family Vacation Home.
Five Years Later…
Obi-Wan tried to make himself look small as Xanatos’ guest entered the mess. It was not hard. He hadn’t had a proper meal in a week -maybe? Time was hard.- and work shifts were long and hard. The beatings didn’t help, either, and the guards flanking the short figure never needed an excuse to single someone out.
“That one.” A machine filtered voice stated, deep and oddly hungry. The weequay across from Obi-Wan offered him a look of pity before pointedly staring at his own watered down gruel. Obi-Wan bit his lip and opened a wound that hadn’t yet had time to heal. “The ginger.”
The guards shuffled in place. “Not that one, sir, Mr. DuCrion has a personal interest in it.”
Obi-Wan imagined his bruised skin was trying to crawl off his body. Xanatos’ guest growled, the vocoder deepening and magnifying the sound. “And now so do I. Lord DuCrion promised me hospitality, yet you deny it?”
“No sir! But, this one is defiant and small, there are much more urk-” The guard dropped his shock prod, wet choking sounds filling the air as he twitched, slowly loosing color. Watching it, Obi-Wan could feel his own breath stuttering. The being was short, taller than Obi-Wan but their stature combined with robes that swamped would have made the scene comical.
The guard stopped moving.
Obi-Wan threw himself out of his seat. He scrambled across the floor and bowed his head at the darksider’s feet. “Stop! Please stop! I’ll take his punishment, just don’t kill him. Please.”
Obi-Wan flinched at the glowing, golden eyes staring down at him. The collar hummed around his throat, keeping him from the Force, and it he couldn’t decide if it was a mercy or not that he couldn’t feel the Dark that had to be circling the being. “... gedet’ye.”
The guard dropped to the floor, the shock of his body hitting the stone floor enough to start him breaking again. His partners crouched at his side.
“I-I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”
“ Gedet’ye. Mando’a for please.” Something shifted in that angry gaze. A clawed hand stroked Obi-Wan’s cheek. “Stand up, Kenobi. I won’t have you on your knees. Not for this trash.”
Obi-Wan followed the darksider out of the mine. He followed him all the way into a small, sleek ship that locked behind them. Lord Maul, as he introduced himself, pushed Obi-Wan onto a bed that could have fit six on him. As Obi-Wan tearfully squeezed soft, cloud like bedding in his filthy hand’s the cloak dropped from the man to reveal… a boy. Not a jawa. A zabrak child around Obi-Wan’s own age that pounced on the bed and pinned the human beneath him. Maul sniffed at his neck, his whole body going boneless as he did so.
“Repeat after me, ner ge’sol.”
“N-Ner ge’sol.”
Lord Maul laughed. “Mhi solus tome.”
“Mhi solus tome.”
“Mhi solus dhar'tome.”
“Mhi solus dhar'tome.” They went back and forth a few more times Lord Maul calling and Obi-Wan answering. As the words Mhi ba'juri verde left Obi-Wan’s mouth a toothy smile spread on the other boy’s face. He sat back, weight on Obi-Wan’s thighs, and made a quick gesture with his hands.
The collar unraveled in sections and the Force flooded Obi-Wan’s senses. He hardly noticed the hand carding through his grimy hair. The other boy sighed, breathe cool and soothing against Obi-Wan’s sticky skin. “One when parted. One when together. You’re mine, Kenobi. As you were always meant to be. Why else would the Jedi send you away? The Force sent you to me.”