Thrashing, Ezra violently tossed and turned in their bed. But, he wasn't in bed with Sabine, who had come clean before they'd retired. She'd only told her husband about snatching the Darksaber, the distinctive lightsaber with its snazzy hilt. Ezra wanted her to tell Kanan too, but she wasn't ready for that. The ancient, black-bladed weapon was something she wanted to hold on to, even though it had been stolen from the Jedi Order by Mandalorians.
While she'd been explaining why she had wanted to keep it, what Maul had said about the Darksaber came to Ezra's mind:
"Your Mandalorian sweetheart could explain it to you…"
The intriguing, venerated weapon had been passed down through generations until it had come into the possession of Pre Vizsla, whom Maul had slain. Maul had wielded the Darksaber in his battle with Darth Sidious, a battle wherein he'd been beaten. Sidious, his former Master, had abandoned him.
According to Ezra's subconscious, at this very moment he was standing alongside Maul. Ezra only wore pj bottoms. Bare-chested, and perspiring profusely, he blinked. Fear spiked in him, but he tamped how that felt down. The Force helped him.
The miscreant was talking to him in a very kind, almost to the point of sickening, gentle voice. They weren't in that cave on Maul's misty planet, Dathomir, where those hideous, shapeshifting monsters had terrorized Sabine, Kanan and him, almost to the point of morbidity.
This planet had two suns, blistering giants that made breathing an ordeal. No wonder it was a desert. The all-encompassing heat was sweltering. Rain was a rarity.
Ezra, his lips parched, was sweating himself into a stupor. Water; he needed water, but there was none. The inhospitable terrain swam before his itchy eyes.
Maul kept referring to this forbidding place as he shouted its weird name.
"Okay, all right. This is Tatooine. I've never been here before. What am I doing here now?" Ezra kept looking around himself, half expecting that those ugly phantoms would pop up at any minute. They scared him to death. He wasn't about to stomach their presence again. Irritated, Ezra barked at Maul, "What are we doing here?"
"Why do you think we're here?" he posed, curling his lips in a most unsettling manner.
The phantasmal proposal pestered. It twisted and whispered as it rode upon the arid wind.
…Turn to the Dark side…turn to the Dark side…turn, turn, turn…
That made Ezra bristle. Persons who answered questions with another question got on his nerves. That, coupled with the unthinkable, annoying suggestion, made him spat, "You're wasting your time. I'll never join you! I'm not going Dark! I'm never going to be your apprentice! I have the best Master in the galaxy, and his name's Kanan!"
Atop the glistening sandy ridge they stood upon as the wind buffeted them, Maul said, "You have so much to learn, my young apprentice. So much that will expand your awareness in ways you've never dreamed of. Rid you of your shortsighted preconceptions that hold you back." An odd expression crossed his exotic face with its protruding horns. His black and red coloring darkened more so. "My eager apprentice, welcome the Dark Side."
Bristling greatly, Ezra shouted, "Stop calling me that! It's so annoying! Besides, none of what you say is helping." He gulped down a big breath, and stammered, "I don't want what you're offering. I won't help you—I can't! Not now, not ever. I'm helping my friends. Not you! They're real, and I belong with them. You're too dangerous, and I'll never trust you." Ezra noticed how Maul's mouth had dropped wide open. That didn't stop him from ranting on. "They helped me when I needed them, and I'm not abandoning them." A fire burned within Ezra, one that flooded him with passionate resolve. For a fleeting moment, clarity set in, dispelling confusion. A profound calmness gripped the teen, who had the sneaking suspicion that he needed to wake up, but couldn't.
Ezra caught Maul when he winced, as though what he'd said hurt Maul deeply. His own Master, a name he would never let himself say, had abandoned him. He was alone, and more often than not now, the relentless loneliness was too much to bear. "I'm your friend too, Ezra. As I told you…we should walk the path together to become brothers." Maul mourned how he'd been separated from his two brothers, long ago. He sounded patient when he spoke these words: "What I will teach you will help your friends. We're on the same side, Ezra. Just…let…go…"
That threatening thought made Ezra tremble with unforgiving uneasiness. Everything that Kanan had ever taught him about cleaving to the Light rushed in on him. Through the Force, Ezra visualized Kanan standing at attention with his lightsaber ignited.
The Force scintillated round about Kanan.
The image of him in Ezra's mind's eye strengthen the Padawan tremendously.
All at once, a staid voice that sounded as old as time itself, wafted on the stifling breeze, stirring a curious feeling within Ezra. The sensation was new, and it seized Ezra, binding him tenaciously.
"…The Dark side is quicker, easier, more seductive. It is your abilities it wants to exploit. If once you start down the dark path, consume you it will…"
Ezra thought, keeping his ideas to himself, closing his mind off, lest Maul endeavored to counteract his will to keep true to what he knew to be right. 'Kanan is right. Maul is the Dark side's agent. I won't allow myself to be seduced. I won't, I won't. I love my wife…' Then he reached out for Sabine through the Force, determined to establish the link they had through their bond. Beads of sweat popped up over Ezra's forehead. He trembled, as before.
Those shiny drops, and Ezra's pallor, didn't escape Maul's notice. "You're making this harder than it has to be." He latched on to Ezra's upper arms and began shaking him soundly. "You must help me find my enemy! He is here!"
Obi-Wan's mellifluent voice trickled into Ezra's ears once again.
"…Your eyes can deceive you; don't trust them…"
Ezra, taking that to heart, stretched out his arm, which felt much heavier than it normally weighed. His hand smacked against Maul's rigid chest. Waves of heat, or maybe it was energy, it was hard to tell because of the brain fog roiling in Ezra's mind, rolled off the deceptive figure, who excelled at hurling mystery like sand in one of Tatooine's infamous sandstorms.
Maul commanded, "The one I seek is speaking to you. I hear him as plainly as I hear your thoughts. Take me to him. Lead the way!"
Ezra's reply was short, but far from sweet: "Go away, Maul! Leave me!" He shrank back from his worrisome instigator, vehemently.
"You're here to do my bidding, boy!" The laughter of the tormentor echoed all around Ezra.
Obi-Wan spoke to him again. "…You're having a bad dream, nothing more. It's high time you wake up. So…wake up! Ezra Bridger, wake up this instant!"
Harkening to the far-removed Jedi's ultimatum, Ezra obeyed. The grip that his dream had on him waned. His eyes sprang open with a small start running through his entire partially-nude body. Sabine, sleeping soundly, snoring ever so lightly, against him, slept on, undisturbed. That was so, until Ezra began shaking violently; their bed quaked.
Sabine's sleep-tinged little voice calmed him when she spoke. "Ez…huh? Ezra? Hey? What's the matter?" She sat straight up then, noting how disoriented he appeared. He was shaken, to the core. His face didn't look like his; it was the face of a haunted man.
He shook his head like someone powerless to control his actions, suddenly. It was unbearably cold in their quarters, his teeth began chattering, loudly. When had Hoth showed up? Unable to answer for several moments, Ezra continued shivering and his woebegone demeanor prompted Sabine to yank him into her arms. She blandished him with soothing words, shielded him with her body and two oversized blankets of downy fantilss.
She kept it up, speaking gently, somewhat firmly. Finally these last words came slowest of all. "Can you tell me?"
Nodding as slowly as she'd spoken, Ezra replied, "I'll never go to the Dark side, Sab."
"Glad to hear it."
"No, I'm serious," he insisted, wheezing as he promised.
"Am I not taking you seriously?" Sabine cooed. "Sweetheart, you're better than your word. That's not news." Her hand went to his moist forehead and she stroked it with tender, loving care. "You're good, Ez. Kanan wouldn't say this if he didn't mean it. 'Nothing the Dark side has to offer tempts you.'" She kissed his forehead, smiling into his eyes. "Rest. Don't worry about a thing. I'm here. I'll never leave you."
Through the Force, Ezra heard Obi-Wan sussurate:
"…Nor will I…"