"So, apprentice, what did you expect?" Ezra grit his teeth and snarled,
"Get out." The voice, which sounded distinctly like Maul's, laughed.
"We have a bond, apprentice," the voice dripped with condescension. "I can't simply 'get out'." Ezra felt anger rising and took a breath, letting it drain out into the force. The voice chuckled once more.
"Is that what your master taught you to do? Breath when anger comes?" When Ezra didn't bother to respond, instead taking his DL-44 from its holster and beginning to fiddle with it. Eza felt more amusement on Maul's end of their bond.
"Worldly distractions? Do you honestly think that will help?" No response came from the teen, who began to inspect th safety of the weapon when he felt a surge of pain through his mind.
"No rash moves," the voice warned, an underlying threat emanating from the words. Ezra laughed.
"Do you think that'll stop me? I'm used to pain." Ezra retorted, gaining some satisfaction when Maul was silent for a moment.
"No, but this will." Ezra clutched his head, hissing in pain. The voice laughed cruelly again.
"Don't even think about it, because I'll know the instant you do." Ezra felt like he was five again. So far Maul had been pointedly angering, turning whatever Ezra said against him. Ezra had had to vent his emotions at least three times that hour, much to the former sith's amusement.
"Silence. Of course. This won't stop anything, apprentice." Ezra felt mild discomfort through the force. Maul had full access to his memories; every feeling, every pang of hunger and sadness he needed. And the former sith used them to great effect. Whenever Ezra made a fair or poignant argument of remark Maul would use his own experiences against him. One day in and Ezra already wanted to die.
"Do you?" Ezra sighed. Maul had heard that.
"Yes, I do, and you're not helping." even more kriffing laughter from Maul's end.
"Don't worry, apprentice; I'll give you plenty of ways to vent that killing spirit of yours," Maul's telepathic speech halted to savor Ezra's discomfort at the statement. "You have one, don't you?" Ezra didn't dignify that remark with a response. Maul'd just bring up his incident with the stormtrooper again.
"Ah...the stormtrooper. You remember, correct? How you nearly killed them when they surrendered? And how your friends turned on you in that moment? If the rebellion stands for freedom and democracy, why are you limited in your decisions?" Ezra and Maul had that conversation several times over the last hour, with it always ending in Ezra's defeat. The youth rose from his seat in the cargo bay and began the journey back to his cot, Maul giving him a golden moment of silence. He didn't notice the footsteps behind him, but felt Maul stirring on his end of their bond.
"Ezra," the teen in question spun to face the source of the voice: Sabine. Again, Maul laughed.
"The mandalorian...wasn't this one you had your first 'crush' on?" Ezra didn't respond, struggling for words as Sabine approached, worry coloring her features. Ezra's breath hitched. He just couldn't get a break, could he?
"There is no rest for the wicked, apprentice." The teen felt a glare forming from his brow and dug his hands into his palms. Sabine cocked a signature eyebrow and placed a hand on her hip.
"Ezra, what's been up with you recently? You've ignored us since Malachor, and now you're talking to yourself. This isn't healthy." Having a sith lord inside your head isn't healthy - you have no idea what I'm going through, The teen thought. Maul gave a small, bitter chuckle that echoed unnaturally inside Ezra's mind.
"Yes, she doesn't - why not tell her?" the question hanged in Ezra's mind, heavy set akin to a fog. Sabine continued to level her gaze at the teen, whose eyes were glazed, as empty as the blackest regions of space.
"Ezra? Sabine to Ezra. hellooooooo?" Ezra blinked. An apologetic gaze met that of the mandalorian.
"Sorry...just thinking," he said, realizing his verbal blunder soon afterward. It was too late.
"About what? You used to share these things with us, remember?" Ezra certainly remembered. He used to talk to the point of irritation. He would talk about anything, really. The weather on the last planet they visited, or their most recent raid. He used to do plenty with the crew; prank, joke, various other forms of mischief used to echo through the Ghost's corridors. Now they were silent, a grim sense of determined purpose the only thing that resided in them.
Ezra realized the silence he'd created and responded,
"Yes, I used to. That was then - this is now. Times change, Sabine." The mandalorian before him glared with fire in her eyes.
"Why?" Sabine demanded, "What's happened to the Ezra that first came on this ship? The one that would smile, joke, prank, what happened to him?" Ezra sighed heavily, a weariness he had no right to seeping into the next statement.
"He's dead - he died on Malachor." Sabine blinked, as Ezra spun on his heel and half-ran to his joint cabin with Zeb. He'd finally said what he knew, deep down, was true.
The old Ezra died on Malachor IV, and the new one rose from its ashes.
Maul withdrew from his apprentice's mind, a smirk across his cracked lips. The boy was breaking emotionally, too. The zabrak barked out a laugh. A twisted, cruel howl that seemed to reverberate in the force. What little life that remained on Dathomir scurried away from the laugh's origin, leaving Maul on more alone. Rising from the pilot's seat of the Savage, he exited the ship.
Dathomir's anciently twisted earth was soft against Maul's boots. The impressions he made on the soil were a reminder that the last heir to the nightsister legacy was using what they had inherited. Demented, wiry trees lacking leaves intertwined above him to form a natural ceiling. Not that it was needed, in any case; it hardly rained on Dathomir, but the dark planet's gesture was noted by the former sith.
Though his lightsaber hung from his hip, Maul knew it wasn't that that kept away Dathomir's scant wildlife. It was him. The former sith always masked his force signature, so well that palpatine had yet to find him. Granted, the arrogant old man probably thought him dead. Yet, his imprint in the force remained, one that would often push away beings or animals of lesser prominence. The former sith mused often in the immediate aftermath of Talzin's death what Sidious was doing; not as a politician - that was obvious even to him - but as a sith. How had he been improving? Was he searching for another apprentice? the first of the questions was rendered moot when Sidious became emperor, as he'd be deep in the bureaucratic marshes. The latter of the two questions still held pertinence. These 'inquisitors' disgusted him. if they were meant to be Sidiouses apprentices, he'd clearly lost sight of what made the sith great. The inquisitors of the ancient sith were numerous and trained for years or even decades to take up the mantle. These were rather reflective of Sidious himself.
They, in comparison to himself, were mere blinks in the force's faultlines. Even his apprentice had a larger signature. Their blades moved to the stereotypical sith styles; Juyo, form V, these were styles he'd mastered long ago. They were mere shadows of the ancient sith. Maul found them annoyances that couldn't be taken for granted. Nuisances dealt with easily enough. Behind the bravado and shock factor of their weapons lay dark side acolytes. These inquisitors were not sith. They never were - never meant to be. The only other servant of Sidious Maul thought to be near sith-level was Darth Vader. No name belonged to the monstrosity other than that.
He'd seen little of the thing known as Vader other than in the early days of the jedi purge. After that he'd just...faded from galactic affairs. Maul was well aware that the monstrosity was a fair and deadly opponent, and planned to train his apprentice to deal with him as such.
Alas, that would come later. Now, he had to secure his apprentice.
AN: this story is almost over. ;( But I'm not done with it. Nowhere near. Or Ezra, for that matter. One final trial remains for him. Any reviews/follows/favorites will be duly noted - Raging Celiac