DARTH MAUL VS. SUPERMAN
EPISODE I
His nerve center cried silently in overdrive, the very fabric of his being awash in a muted timbre of death, one that the Man of Steel was not unfamiliar with. He screamed in anguish after barreling into the ground from an unknown distance for at that moment he was no longer a Superman. Not while blood trickled down his brow, nor while his orbital bones pulsated with a fractured pain too brutal to relent against. Exhausted from his fall, the last son of Krypton stood and then unceremoniously collapsed onto the dry, cracked ground of an unforeseen and unknown alien land.
The wretched pain in his body brought an unbearable weight, one that held him tightly against the floor. His fingers, each strong enough to snap the strongest titanium strand, fluttered amongst the rock beneath him. The Kryptonian was searching for the tell-tale molecules of sun drenched exposure, suctioning the energy of his adopted homeworld into his ravenous and damaged body. However, the Man of Steel quickly realized his fingers clawed at soil which provided no such nourishment for his Kryptonian form. Drenched in sweat, his right hand caked in blood, he forced his fingertips further into the hard ground, sinking his digits into the soil . Sensitive to a microscopic degree, this foreign land lacked the familiar, soothing radiance of land bathed in the yellow sunlight of Mother Earth's ecosystem.
This ground was baked harshly in an environment that felt as if it was plunged into the core of a million stars, one after another without care or reason. Superman glanced at his body, and remembering years of complacency derived from the malaise of thousands of one-sided battles against Earthlings, he now discovered something anew: True pain.
The shock of agony washed over his skin, jolting his facilities. This planet did not sustain him as generously as the soil of Earth enlivened by a generous sun, but the Kryptonian required he sustenance, knowing that his mortal being relied on whatever nutrients he could seize from the alien grounds.
I am weak. I am dying…
In moments of his youth, the alien who would be known as the Man of Steel came to understand the extent of his invulnerability, bringing about adolescent contemplation of his own end. And now, even in this moment of pure anguish, in this cursed moment of becoming a mindless beast in eternal pain, even he, in some ethereal sense, knew if he were to perish mere physicality would not end his being. He was forever, the immortal, the man that was the god that refused to be god to be a man.
I could just shut my eyes. Rest. And the pain would fade into the darkness of slumber…
But yet Superman continued the struggle, denying the grip of what was an inevitable end. He chose consciously to suffer, to live, to endure.
Lois…
All for the love of a woman. The incessant memory of his deceased foe General Zod prompted a new level of self-disdain within the Man of Steel. For Zod knew Lois was a woman, but more importantly, a human woman, an Earthling. She was inferior in all comparison to even the slightest Kryptonian, no less the Last Son of Krypton. Part of Zod's incredulity at the half-breed's misplaced logic was that Kal-El sought to protect a world that feared his powers. Even the Man of Steel wondered in his most heartfelt, clandestine moments wondered whether his eventual demise was to come more readily from a familiar "friend" rather than unknown foe. All due to his commitment in becoming a child of Earth, a backwards, violent planet where his countenance was the only similarity he shared with its native populace. These were Zod's words; one of the few Kryptonians that survived the destruction of their homeworld. What hope did Earth have, when Krypton, with its extreme technology and advanced civilization gave way to civil war and destruction? Earth had a mere fraction of the ingenuity of his descendants, yet in their evolutionary infancy, mankind was precariously close to a sudden and violent end.
Even though Superman's love for his adopted homeworld was unrivaled, he questioned the wisdom of the greater minds of the planet Earth. After all the bylines written by Clark Kent regarding violence in a brutal world for the Daily Planet, he had increasing doubts about his ability in saving a planet so devoted to destroying itself.
The waves of pain shook him from his doldrums. Lois, he thought, and for a moment, as his head grew light and threatened to cease functioning, he urged his mind to stir. Superman understood that his adopted planet, his lifetime on Earth, had weakened his biology in one significant manner; his body had acclimated much too well to the Earth's geological generosity, and now so far from his adopted home, his injuries from his immense fall left him weary, unsteady, and half dead.
He thought again of the woman known as Lois Lane. He denied she was the reason he remained on Earth, but his mind relented through the pain to a decided truth; she was the representation of what Kal-El, Clark Kent, and Superman felt was essentially good about the humanity. Without her, or were it were not for the Kents, his adopted parents, his loyalty to the green and blue sphere would not have endured with all the corruption and evil he had seen.
Yet, never did he think to question why he should stay on Earth; if he were deliberate, even logical in thought, the answer would lead him down a dark, but truthful realization.
His hand squeezed the ground tighter, to the point where the friction of his grasp turned the minerals into a milky, diamond like substance. At least, thought Superman, there was carbon within the soil, enough to impact upon compression. Though this world was alien, its roots were not as distant as it appeared at first glance. Hidden power, fuel for his soul, lingered in the particulates of the planet's red soil.
The Man of Steel felt the fog lift over his thoughts, the disorientation parting enough to allow a clear thought. The Kryptonian placed his left hand gingerly on his ribs, realizing though this planet's gaia provided him with sustenance, the energy wasn't nearly the same as the surge of power he received under the Earth's yellow sun. It was as if he were soaking power through a clogged funnel, a bottleneck in some form limiting the rate and volume in which Superman could attain full functionality.
"Some Man of Steel," Superman muttered, a dizzy spell still playing havoc with his senses. It was his self-impression that shrunk in stature with each breath of the alien air. He almost chuckled; the most powerful man in the Milky Way reduced to a stumbling, bumbling, piercing headache. "This is what it must be like to feel drunk," Superman, or rather, his more "human" persona, Clark Kent thought. But how would Clark Kent understand the vagaries of sensation that came with inebriation. Not when his true self could never succumb to any such banal peril as too much drink.
Superman rubbed dry, red dirt from his eyes, realizing that the grit was practically embedded into his pupils. For a moment, through the grime, his eyes focused just long enough to catch a metallic glint in the distance, a kilometer or more from his position according to the Man of Steel's extended vision. A stern, dry wind coursed through the desolate, barren flatlands, and, once again, his superhuman eyes fought to refocus on the mysterious object.
However, what was once there was now gone, and try as he may to strain the muscles in his eyes to its full telescopic capacity, Superman saw nothing save a flatland of red, cracked dirt underneath a cloudless red sky. It was as if he were watching this foreign land through a red filter. After adjusting his vision through the various degrees of its all-seeing capacity, Superman saw nothing save endless barren lands surrounded by mountains on the fringes of the horizon.
He leapt up in the air, only to stumble and collapse, out of breath, winded. It was a new sensation, to feel the pull of fatigue, to see his Kryptonian uniform, with its fabled "S" shaped family crest so dingy, dirtied by the dark splotches of black and red stains. The marks on his suit were telling; his hard landing on this world was of such force that the edges of his cape were frayed, and his Kryptonian garb, torn.
It would take an impact beyond comprehension to tear the Kryptonian fabric of my suit, Superman thought. Then, feeling his body finally adjusting to this strange land, he finally stood without falling. He immediately felt the aches and pains in his body, and the red sun that shone directly above him but brought only a dim modicum of invigoration to this parched land. But he was drawing energy from this sun. Thus, he was drawing life.
He struggled to fly once more, only to breathlessly grab his chest. The heavy air was different, the sunlight was different, he was different, here in this abstraction of hell for the Man of Steel. For Superman, though cognizant of his ever present abilities, felt the harsh warmth of the red sun stripping him of his strength. With every painful gasp of the planets thick, almost tangible atmosphere, Superman felt reduced, more like Clark Kent than the Man of Steel.
The thought chilled him; now he was closer to being human than achieving the physical feats of a Kryptonian. His power was weakened, hence, his belief in himself suffered from a doubt that, though inarticulate, was as ever present as the ground underneath his feet. He was a shadow of the omnipotent being of Earth's lore. All he could wonder was how long must he stay in this Hades before he had the strength to leave.
He glided several feet off the ground before the unbearable pain and heavier gravity of the realm forced him down. The Man of Steel soon realized he was marooned on this planet, and in an uncharacteristic fit of fear, he screamed in frustration at this devil of a world, at the stars in the sky, but mostly at the man he once was, and for who the man he would never be again.
The Dathomiri's sickly red pupils glowed underneath the black shroud draped over his head. The rough hem of dark fabric hid the coiled energy that lived underneath the robes of the dark Jedi, but Darth Maul felt nothing. Not the tangle of the heat stream as warm blasts of current fluttered almost tangibly as liquid over his garb. Not as dry wind brushed his hide where blood red skin met the scarred darkness of black tattoos carved into his being as well as his soul.
Those lines of dark, criss-crossing strata, sliced underneath his epidermis in a violent, bloody ceremony was a constant reminder of the man's place amongst the Sith; he was a beast, one to be branded, one to be used and then left to die. But the horned creature, lost in the shadows of his dark thoughts, moved underneath the sharp angles of his spacecraft, the Sith Interceptor. With sanctuary from the red sun overhead, he regained his sense of all knowing vigilance, secure in the knowledge that the Sith Interceptor overhead ran its stealth generators making it near invisible, even at this distance. Darth Maul stood mere meters from the landing gear of the Interceptor, yet only his discerning eyes could make out the rough outline of the craft along with the steady hum of pulsating energy needed to preserve the illusion of invisibility.
He reached underneath his cloak and retrieved a pair of image enhancers.
There, he thought, as he watched through his device, seeing a sign of life. A weakling fool of such childish costume floating in the air before falling back to ground. His enhancer technology assisted in allowing him to see the damage to the being. However, it was his dark force focus ability that enabled Maul to sense the severity of the man's injuries. The realm of sorcery that germinated from within the recesses of what made Darth Maul a Dark Lord slowly reached out in invisible waves, sensing the fool's vulnerabilities and weaknesses.
This thing wishes not to harm despite his power. He feels a need for pittance for all that he has harmed or killed. A fool amongst fools, even greater than the Jedi.
The Dathomiri's mind raced for a moment as the savagery reared through his passionate nature. For whatever reason, his soul and all of the darkness within it cried for his hands to overtake this fool of a man now, while he was weakened, for his Sith sense whispered that this man-creature in blue was a powerful adversary and one that was not to be taken lightly.
Maul's own vision confirmed that impression. The man in the foreign blue garb moved unsteadily, but moved nevertheless. Even after Maul watch as he plunged from an unfathomable height into the hard packed ground of this lost world, he still lived. The Dathomiri questioned if even the mightiest of the Dark Lords of the Sith could achieve survival from such a feat. The answer, he surmised, was that nearly all would perish. Yes, this being was of great strength, his only weakness was his character.
No matter, he thought. In order to claim his goal of attaining status as the mightiest of the Dark Lords, Maul knew he must be tested against the pinnacle in adversarial quarries. Once he defeated this fool-man, he would resume training, developing his force powers in secret. Then, that old Sith bastard Darth Sidious would pay for his crimes against his weakened, childhood self. His master's death would be fruitless, but necessary; it satisfied the rage within the lost child Sidious stole from the womb of his homeworld. Nothing would alter the brief history of the boy that he was, the memory as dim as the stars are bright. But the glory of this vengeance, after countless years of servitude to the wizened Dark Lord Sidious, was a reward not lost on the endless fires that burned within Maul.
Darth Maul inhaled deeply, raising his hand towards the man in blue, extending his consciousness towards his prey. Already, the sickening sense of naïveté radiated from this dull creature. His vile sense of righteousness mimicked the antiquated testaments of the Jedi. The Jedi, he chuckled with disdain, with their hypocritical roles as peace keepers amongst the galaxy's bureaucrats. All fools, the horned Sith Lord thought, every idealistic one of them, and their demise would make the galaxy no weaker.
It was always the very same galaxy that erupted into endless power struggles whether the fools were in government or indulging in government's true nature; war mongering. Yet these very same philistines, who brandished war staffs with a pound of their chests, did so with indecisiveness, without conviction. However the Sith, was especially well suited for the inevitable battle that was yet to come. For as long as Maul was a perpetual hunter and an unrivaled duelist, he would forever be a Sith; he would always desire death and destruction, the penultimate truth to the Sith existence.
Maul had the singular comprehension of the Sith; that all existence, especially that pertinent to the Republic, cowered in private while speaking of strength in public. To rain death down on his foes, to stand as they lain with his double bladed weapon with its crimson glow in tow were persistent, constant thoughts that Darth Maul would continually revel in. His vision of the enemy's freshly cauterized blood sizzling off his lightsaber, the inevitable blood truth exposed to the outside world; flesh split open, viscera cooling painfully as the light shined out of their eyes, a dream of what Maul truly cherished and lived for.
Yes, he must defeat this foe of foes. It was in his nature to conquer, to dominate, and who was Maul not to provide satisfaction to the Sith blood that coursed through his body.
Though Darth Maul did not understand how he was deposited in this alien realm, it did not trouble him. A lifetime of Sith slavery had encumbered him to adversity. Whatever circumstances brought him to this world at the very least did not drop him from the skies as it did his powerful costumed foe. He also was granted his Sith Interceptor, his starship, his lonely companion amongst the darkness of space. Along with the normal arsenal of speeder bike, droids and other tools of his dark trade, Darth Maul felt he could defeat any being no matter how powerful. Why the alien was left with only the tatters of a ridiculous and impractical uniform while Maul was given his bounty of weaponry was a question that held no meaning for him. It accomplished no task. And if anything, the Sith known as Darth Maul only existed for the mission and nothing else. Nothing else mattered. Not to a Sith.
The dark arts were too powerful for any being, Maul thought, the tightness of his grimace resembling a dark, pained smile. Yes, the hidden reservoirs of power that only the Sith could command would reign supreme on this day, existing through an invisible air of dread and fear that was palpable and thick. There would be no salvation from its grasp, no shelter from the steady shadow of doom that shrouded all in the tightness of Maul's clenched fist. A fist he envisioned wrapped around his prey's throat, gently squeezing, almost caressing the life out of the creature.
From his vantage point underneath the Sith Interceptor, the Dathomiri extended his power over the force to the forefront of its range. He watched as the man in blue turned, somehow sensing Darth Maul's mindful invasion of his spirit. Immediately, the horned figure ceased his unseen inquiry, lowering his hand, stepping further back, deeper underneath the recesses of the Interceptor. The Sith felt uneasy at being discovered.
How can this being, so beneath my skills, sense my presence? It was as if the mere thought of this costumed fool acknowledging Maul's presence was the gravest of insults to his Sith pride; a travesty so grave, that it produced an unquenchable rage within Maul. The man in blue turned to face him, as if he could sense the anger welling in Maul, even though the Sith was confident that the Interceptor's stealth engines were functional and holding.
Maul's hand slowly made its way underneath his cloak, his fingers wrapping around the hilt of his lightsaber. The Sith thought of the best way to extract his weapon, draw it, and ignite the power in its dual bladed ends. Maul imagined the quick parry, the swinging thrust, the decapitation; clean, quick.
The man in blue, groggily, unsteadily, walked towards Maul. Granted, Maul was still a great distance from his prey, still safe beneath the Sith Interceptor, lost in his own… Phantom Zone. Maul found it perplexing for a moment, knowing that the foreign phrase "Phantom Zone" was obviously a latent mental draw from his force powers imbedding itself in the man in blue; his Sith powers revealing hidden details of the creature's thoughts. Maul tentatively extended himself further into his target's mind, probing deeply, find words and images, nonsensical to him, yet clues to his adversary's true nature.
The man took several more steps towards Maul. The Dark Lord immediately retracted his power of mind extension. He'd already taken too many chances at revealing himself directly to this inferior being, but from the information he gleaned, it was worth the risk.
He thinks like a Jedi. They were small, narrow thoughts that began and ended with an abstraction of justice that ignored the squalid, brutal methods that bring about such results. But the Sith sensed something else within the man and for a moment a jolt of terror found its way down the Sith's spine. Darth Maul's composure never ceased, as was the Sith way, but it was too late; Maul knew a brief moment of fear, and the chill shamed and angered him.
The man in blue took one more tentative step closer, his feet crunching against the arid, blood red ground. The Sith fingered his saber wielding hand, locked and unmoving on the handle of his weapon. He had slowly put his image enhancer away, fearful that the glare of its lenses would be too telling of his perch. But even without mechanically enhanced eyesight, the Sith could vaguely make out the symbol on the man in blue's chest with his enhanced Force vision.
A curved sign with a roughly diamond shaped geometrical symbol. Maul didn't recognize the language or even if the symbol meant anything past its rather banal appearance.
However, it appeared as if this man, this…super man… could sense the Sith's presence. Though Maul felt this…Kryptonian…had little mastery of the force. Yet here they were, a vast distance apart, staring at one another with their senses, their feelings more than mere physical vision. Maul surmised that if so much could be learned of the Kryptonian through his use of the Force, this Superman, a being with formidable powers, may have learned something of Maul's own skills.
Darth Maul remained still, moving his index finger ever so slightly. The cargo doors of the Sith Interceptor opened slowly, quietly. From out of the cavernous hold of the starship emerged a black probe droid.
Maul twitched another finger.
Another droid hummed to life as it was activated. He held his hand steady and both probes fluttered in place ready to obey his commands. They fluttered mere meters above ground, rising ever so slightly to Maul's eye level. A flick of his fingers and a short burst of the Force implemented the attack formulations he had pre-programmed within the probe' attack protocols.
The man in blue reacted as if could hear the probes charge their primary weapons. Impossible, thought Maul, knowing that at this distance the creature couldn't possibly hear…yet, the living Force indicated that this Superman had natural powers that matched any of his greatest adversaries. He watched as the super man moved forward, unsteadily, then, in a feat worthy of his moniker, rose in the air in a forceful leap.
Maul quickly waved his probe droids forward, taking a silent pleasure with his own foresight; he had altered the droids with a detachment of heavy weaponry, diminishing their ability to spy, but increasing their ability to hurt, maim, and kill. The black probes rocketed towards the target on powerful anti-gravity engines, each droid possessing twin blasters that continuously fired a kaleidoscope of concentrated laser blasts. The man in blue, suddenly aware of the attack, deftly avoided the first battery of lasers, unaware that Maul followed behind the droid's distractive attack, coursing through the air on the back of his speeder bike.
Maul leapt from his speeder, pirouetting in the air while simultaneously igniting his lightsaber in a deft swing, nearly slashing through the neck of this Superman. If it weren't for the Kryptonian's acute senses, this fool would have been yet another adversary lost to the Sith's crimson blade. But Kal-El's Kryptonian reflexes were too fast for the directness of the Sith's deadly gambit. And though the man in blue howled in agony, the pain forcing him to collapse to a single knee, he was able to dodge another violent swing from Maul's lightsaber before leaping backwards to a distance the Sith could not easily close.
Maul stared at the Man of Steel in unabashed rage; he sensed the wounds he carved on the Kyptonian beast were not winning blows. The dark rage in the Sith overwhelmed his tactical senses; he declined to call back his droids for a secondary attack. For a reason unknown to his dark sensibilities, Darth Maul wanted, no, needed, to destroy this Superman with his bare hands.
The man, the one that Maul had come to know in his mind's eye as Superman, gathered himself and stood up to face the Sith. Maul, feeling forces gathering against him, ignited the second blade of his lightsaber, readying himself just as Superman's eyes began to glow a brilliant red. Twin beams of light erupted from his pupils, the force and power of the blast making his skin translucent, making his orbital bones pulsate with a red hot radiance.
Darth Maul slashed with his weapon, spinning his lightsaber in deflective patterns, swatting away the brilliant lasers with his own energy based mainstay. The Man of Steel's attack did not cease however, as he continued to blast at Maul, and though the Sith was able to use his lightsaber to defend himself, the pure red heat from the Man of Steel's rays of light set his cloak on fire. With disdain, Darth Maul cast off his shroud, revealing the jet black robe he wore underneath. He sensed this Superman was losing energy from his projectile assault, and for a moment, the Sith settled, almost relaxed.
The force of Kal-El's next heated gaze, though deflected by Maul's lightsaber, was powerful enough to knock Maul off his feet. His Sith training, allowed him the aerial acrobatics to somersault and land perfectly as such. But, of course, the Sith Lord only knew perfection, and despite the massive blast, he landed a safe distance away, able to regain his fighting position; having his lightsaber at the ready to block, parry and attack once more.
The Sith expected the Kryptonian to attack suddenly, following his attack with another melee consisting of pure rage. It was then that Darth Maul, the champion of a hundred duels would prevail.
His anger, his rage will consume him. He will attack blindly. He will fail. And I will cut him down like any other foe that should challenge me.
But, the Kryptonian stood silently, his ever present composure barely finding purchase amidst the mountain of rage he felt building towards this demon of a man.
Hence, Superman and the Sith were left facing one another. There was a long silence as both men breathed the heavy air of the planet, following each other's movement with hooded, unblinking eyes. There was no room for words in the distance between them, nothing that could be said to defuse their mutual hatred. Each man held his ground waiting and watching while the world turned underneath them. Then, without hesitation, the duelists attacked one another, and the planet they stood underneath them shook with the effort.
END EPISODE I – DARTH MAUL VS. SUPERMAN
Notes:
*** Episode II of this series will be completed only with additional interest by the Star Wars/Man of Steel/Fan Fiction community. Due to a tight time schedule, I will only create Episode II if I achieve at least 100 positive responses from the sci-fi community. Please indicate interest in the creation of another episode in this series by contacting me directly at: danny .
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