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Let Chaos Reign Chapter 38: Letting Go of the Past
A slash to the side followed by a flurry of thrusts and cuts, each with the power and force to break the body of anyone who wasn’t gifted with the power of the Force.
Maul was a black and red tornado, nonstop movement and aggression. He was far more patient, though, having learned his lesson back when he was still stuck in that suit, and Kenobi managed to survive him for so long. Back then, he was all he could think of.
Now… Maul didn’t know what to think. He still despised Kenobi, but it wasn’t the roaring inferno of hate he once held. That was directed towards his former master. If anything, this was just as Tobi described it.
A means for him to get his run back. The words didn’t mean anything to him when he first heard them since he didn’t exactly know what that was supposed to mean. After some contemplation he realized he was referring to reclaiming the loss he had taken at the hands of Kenobi.
The man in question struggled under the several dozen blows dealt to him faster than a man might blink. He was playing defensively, using Soresu to a high degree. Unfortunately for him, Maul was using Niman after gaining enough experience with it and several other forms.
If he was using his old form of Juyo, then Kenobi could have held his own. His time under Tobi and Pitou’s tutelage had made him less prideful and willing to realize his mistakes. Mistakes like his brashness and arrogance in the past that cost him everything.
A leg snapped out, forcing the Jedi who cut him in half to move lest he wanted a broken knee. Out of position and forced to move, Maul slammed his double-bladed lightsaber down onto him, making him gasp and struggle under the power he was subjected to.
Air rushed back, the ground cracked and cratered, and Kenobi’s feet were now in the ground. He huffed and breathed heavily, already worn out. Maul, on the other hand, was still full of energy.
To think that a method of breathing was all it took to further push his body beyond what he could do before…
Even if Maul had only used the breathing technique, thunder breathing, against his old self, he would have won easily. That’s not getting started on his increased skill and power in the Force.
A warning came through, said mystical power, his head moved to the side lazily, blade locking Kenobi again before a series of punches were delivered into his torso, making him gasp. His mouth opened even more when a knee was brought into his diaphragm.
His blue blade almost dropped from his hands when he was sent tumbling back with a burst of air following in his wake. Maul, not far behind him, his crimson blade never stopping even when he was knocked away. Gouges and trenches carved into the barren ground around them are a stark contrast to the forest and abundant life in the distance, and Kenobi is far enough from his clones that they wouldn’t be of much help.
His feet dug into the ground, digging trenches before his eyes narrowed, wiping a trickle of blood from his mouth, and breathing in lungfuls of air.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” Maul hissed, hand raised, meeting Kenobi’s own hand.
The Force grew turbulent, what was once a slightly chaotic river became a raging, frothing one that threatened to flood its surroundings. Maul felt it heed his call, coming far faster than it ever had in the past.
His hand held gently in the air, his belief in what he could do and how Kenobi wasn’t going to overcome him. Not this time.
He was moving slower now, almost indifferent, the anger and negative emotions becoming more subdued, yet his power and command of the Force didn’t lessen in the slightest. It showed how far he had come, his belief that anger alone wasn’t necessary.
The two telekinetic forces met, and it wasn’t even a contest. Mauls shattered Kenobi’s attack like it was a porcelain pot tossed in the way of a speeder. His attack slammed into and broke apart Kenobi’s while ploughing through the ground and any rock in its path.
Kenobi’s eyes widened before narrowing. To Maul's surprise, the Jedi managed to surprise him yet again. Instead of using the Force for offense, he felt him channel it around him in a tight bubble, the calm and peace overtaking any pain or emotion the man had felt before that interfered with his concentration.
His usage of the Force rushed to meet him like a raging tide going right for a lone solitary rock that, by all rights, should have been crushed and turned to nothing. Instead, it met him, and for a few seconds Kenobi gritted his teeth and pushed back several meters as a perfectly round shape of ground was carved out around him when the destructive wave slammed into him.
The ground cracked and broke apart, dust and dirt sent flying everywhere as it kicked up a dust storm that blanketed the surroundings. The air itself cracked from the impact, sending the dirt and dust high into the sky.
Yet despite getting pushed back like a battering ram just hit him, his barrier held strong. The push parted before him, the man focusing more on defense than he was on offense now.
The tide took with it the dust and dirt in the air as the dark cloud moved off into the distance, with the land being remade and shaped to its destructive might.
There Obi-Wan Kenobi stood, unbroken if not a little worse for wear. Maul contemplated using another push to test to see how much he could take, considering how much he had held back. That push would have been more than enough to topple anywhere from a battalion to a regiment. That included heavy armored vehicles.
Once he had internalized Tobi’s theory, it was proven true. The stones he managed to lift almost all but one and could maintain for thirty seconds. It was deemed sufficient by Tobi to join them on this mission and a reward for him.
With his newfound understanding of the Force, Maul had grown greatly from what he once was. It may as well be the difference between the distance of this dirt ball of a planet and the star of the system.
He appreciated the reward even if it no longer held the appeal it had back when he first saw Kenobi again. He didn’t savor or enjoy it as much as he would have back when he regained his legs. Kenobi was a puppet, anger and resentment at what he took from Maul were still there, but it was mild now when he contemplated the source of all his suffering.
He saw the bigger picture and was close to letting go of that resentment that was left. It was more about proving to Maul he didn’t lose because Kenobi was better than him, it was more about getting closure and leaving this chapter of his life behind.
The one he sought out was Sidious. Kenobi might be of use to help bring him down considering what Tobi had told him. Without even knowing or intentionally trying to disrupt his plans, he had managed to do so multiple times. And even more than that, he had survived Maul's attack.
With his mind clear and his emotions under better control, he could see the usefulness in keeping Kenobi around.
“I think…” He breathed heavily, trying to get it under control. “I do remember you. I take it you're the one who was using that armored suit to attack me?”
He was subtly observing his surroundings, trying to find anything he could use to his advantage. He made no move to attack.
Maul merely stood there, calmly observing the man before him. After coming to a decision Maul reached a hand up and lowered the hood from his head.
Whatever Obi-Wan Kenobi was about to say died on his tongue when the face of the man who killed his master and almost killed him stood before him. A wry smile wormed its way onto Maul's face.
“That’s more like it.” Maul purred, some satisfaction bubbling up inside him with what was left of his resentment towards Kenobi.
He was… content with this. He felt satisfied in a way he had never felt before in his life. It was nice. His time under Sidious would have him see it as a weakness. Now he was fine with the feeling and wouldn’t suppress or smother it in an attempt to replace it with more anger, hate, and any other dark emotions.
He hadn’t realized how empty he had become until he began to learn under Tobi and Pitou. He had become no better than a burnt-out husk, all his hate and anger ate away at him just as it was used to burn his enemies.
He felt fulfilled, to an extent. The empty void in him was filled temporarily by his desire for vengeance against his former master.
“You.” Was all Obi-Wan could bring himself to say, eyes narrowed to slits, nostrils flaring. The wit he was known for nowhere to be found. In fact, this was the most emotion Maul had seen him express so far.
“Me. The one who killed your old master. The one you believed dead.” Maul didn’t feel much joy even if some satisfaction was gained from this simple reveal and exchange of words.
“This isn’t possible.” He said, breaking the stare down with only the wind and sound of blasters and explosions in the distance. “You are dead. I did it with my own hands and watched you fall into that reactor shaft.”
Obi-Wan was in disbelief. He was trying to deny who stood before him. Maul felt some annoyance at the man’s denial, but other than that the anger and hate that had at one point in time consumed him just fizzled out.
“Whether you accept I am alive and standing before you now is irrelevant. What does matter is that you and I have unfinished business.” Maul calmly strode forward while Obi-Wan glared at the former Sith Lord.
“Then it is true. Tobi is the Sith Master we have been after all this time.”
Maul stopped midstep, tilting his head as if he hadn’t heard what Kenobi had said correctly. He opened and closed his mouth, trying to find his words. There was no way…
“You think Tobi is the Sith Lord responsible for this war? You can’t be serious.” Maul's own voice mirrored Obi-Wan's disbelief for different reasons.
“You of all people are proof enough of who he is.” Obi-Wan countered back calmly, finally getting his breathing back under control.
Maul mulled over what he just said and for a time contemplated arguing it but chose not to. A pointless endeavor, especially when he of all people could see and even understand Kenobi’s reasoning. Even if the man’s doubts about such a thing could be felt through the Force, he still had some doubt. But it was smothered under the newly gained belief Tobi was Sidious.
“Well then, if you have come for your revenge, you're more than welcome to try. But I won’t make it easy for you.” Obi-Wan said with steel in his voice. His resolve had grown firm, as the man held his lightsaber at the ready, completely resolute to fight to the bitter end.
Letting out a sigh he had been holding, Maul simply watched the man, seeing the dust cloud he had created play havoc on a distant group of Separatist forces and the Republics.
“I did not come here for revenge… At least not now. When I was discovered after being abandoned, it was all I could think of.” He closed his eyes unafraid of Kenobi, writing him off not completely as a threat, but more because he seemed to be more mentally capable than the majority of his order. “It is more for closure for me than anything else by this point.”
Kenobi slowly relaxed, if ever so slightly, never truly dropping his guard as he stared at the man who killed Qui-Gon right before his eyes. The brutal monster he remembered attempting to run Anakin over in the deserts of Tatooine all for his sick enjoyment was nowhere to be seen.
In his place was a dangerous man, but one that oddly enough seemed reasonable.
“Then why attack me?” Obi-Wan was at a loss as to what the man truly wanted. He knew now he was inside of that lightsaber-resistant suit with it all making sense now.
The fighting style and his intense desire to hunt and kill him. Yet… What stood before him was no longer the same person. He still had his similarities to who he once was, but he was different enough to make Obi-Wan come up short. Everything else adding onto his confusion wasn’t helping.
“To prove to myself that when you defeated me all those years ago wasn’t because you were better. That I was beaten by my own hubris. And I have my answer.”
Maul turned his head slightly when the sounds of the clones coming to back up Obi-Wan greeted both of them. The white armored men raised their blasters alongside the walker with its main cannon aimed right at Maul.
Before Obi-Wan could give an order, the clones didn’t hesitate in opening fire. Blasters rained down towards Maul with the main cannon firing its salvo. Maul weaved and dodged the blaster fire with ease.
One hand held his double-bladed lightsaber, blocking nearly every single shot fired. Many were redirected back towards the clones, making them fall in droves. Yet Maul held no smile or took any pleasure from this. Only a slight enjoyment from a fight, something that he had always come to appreciate.
It was one of the only forms of joy he had when learning under Sidious or any of the instructors he had taught him. The AT-TE’s shot neared Maul, and in an impressive burst of speed, he avoided that shot, so fast that even Obi-Wan only saw an afterimage.
It was so fast that for most people like the clones it seemed like Maul had just teleported. The tanks' shot detonated, leaving behind a smoldering crater, and Maul, with his other hand free while his lightsaber went back to deflecting blaster fire since the moment the clones spotted where he moved, didn’t even hesitate.
They tried to overwhelm him by concentrating their fire on his torso. It would have worked against nearly anyone else even with the Force, but Maul wasn’t just anyone else.
The walking tank lined up another shot, but Maul was annoyed with it, and he needed to test out his new technique. It was something he had tried to copy from Tobi after witnessing it a few times.
His open hand had his palm facing the sky. Despite the constant blaster fire and even heavy blaster cannons fired by the tanks' cockpits, he was calm. He was in his element, a fight was something he was accustomed to.
It took a not so insignificant amount of time for him to be capable of focusing when he was at the castle amidst the garden. At peace surrounded by beautiful things was at odds with all the training Maul had gone through in all his life.
He could only snort at what he had known all his life was brutality, darkness that could be physical, spiritual, or mental, and power and it being lorded over others like he had or had been done to him in turn.
Then to have that dropped on its head and shattered to pieces to be replaced with silks he knew most of the galaxy’s richest could only dream to afford even a small fragment, food that would make even the fattest of gluttons willing to starve themselves for months if it meant having even a single scrap, and peaceful and elegant views that made Maul question just what his life had become.
But all this change did help give him clarity as he learned to adapt.
A few black sparks formed when he called upon the dark side. The familiar allure of power it always promised and gave him a taste of before trying to submerge him in it. Like black tar, it sprouted spiritual tendrils to embrace him, Maul did the unthinkable and brushed them aside.
He still used the dark side, but unlike his teachings with Sidious, Tobi’s perspective on things had opened his eyes. He used the power of the dark side without the corruptive influence it would have on him.
At first, when he had first made this attempt when he adopted Tobi’s perspective on the Force and how an individual’s belief can make nearly anything possible, he came to a radical idea -- use the dark side without destroying his mind and body.
Tobi described it like a drug at one point when they discussed things after a sparring session. It was a rather good, if dumbed-down, way to describe it. One that Maul had learned to tear out the hooks and tendrils it had sunk into him over the years he had used it.
The sparks snapped out like hungry dragons, greedily snapping at the air itself with the blackened bodies that made them up having a hint of purple in them.
The clones tank was still shifting its main cannon towards him with the rest of the soldiers bred for war watching in horror, their fear felt through the Force as it was siphoned off towards what Maul was attempting. Maul twirled the lightsaber, batting aside a nearly blue river of blaster bolts back towards the clones, and began to move while concentrating to form his attack.
Idly glancing off to the side to see a grenade tossed his way. A hop and a skip followed by sending a torrent of bolts that killed a dozen clones before his leg was brought back, and he pivoted on his heel, evading more blaster fire, before kicking the grenade back where it came from.
The screams of terror were followed by limbs being sent across the area with dirt and smoke. Bodies sent flying back now unmoving and dead as the dirt they laid upon. Others cried out in pain as their brothers were too preoccupied to help them when the threat still stood across from them.
Kenobi began to move to try and stop Maul, but he may as well have been frozen in place for how slow he moved. Maul pictured himself as he had learned to do after he refused to end up like he did when Tobi found him.
Using the dark side like he did had practically broken him. Had Tobi not found him when he did, he likely would have lost his mind after that point. Elements of his time in isolation and using the Force to sustain himself for several years still remained, mental scars of what he was forced to endure.
He didn’t want to go back to that or ever experience it again. So he sought a way to keep his power but remove the destructive effect the dark side had on him.
He stood upon a beach, with a dark, turbulent ocean in front of him. The dark waters rushed to tug at his feet and legs, the cold feeling unnatural, and for most others who first experienced it, it would have felt like an unfathomable fear. Maul long since ignored that feeling.
The sparks condensed, growing thicker, and the clones brought out rocket launchers when they realized their methods were not going to work.
Maul remained anchored to the beach, the desolate ocean bubbling, becoming even more treacherous. Waves and great tendrils made from the black waters formed towering over Maul. He remained rooted to his spot, he remained calm despite the great tendril slamming down onto him.
Instead of crushing and dragging him into the depths, Maul remained standing, and the tendril broke apart against him, splashing the black tar everywhere but him. Not even a drop stained him beyond what was embracing and tugging at his legs.
Maul's hand became cupped, the black sparks collecting together before a hum filled the air. Despite it being softer than the sound of blaster fire and the screams, it overcame all of that sound as Maul drew upon the darkness but didn’t let it drag him into the depths.
This was something that took immense concentration and effort for his part, and he was making far better progress than he had in prior attempts. He had reached the level of skill he needed to use it.
The dark oily water did as commanded and rose up alongside his arm, gathering into his palm as it was siphoned and funneled into it. Faces howled and cried out in pain and fear in noises that made the black water shift and change through a myriad of dark colors that Maul had no word for.
The ground beneath him on the beach cracked and cratered, but he still remained firmly where he was when the darkness around him swirled in a vortex that turned nearly everything black around him.
Kenobi was halfway towards Maul, lightsaber ready to lop his arm off. Maul was unconcerned, for he had all the time in the world.
Then it finally happened. A small dark orb the size of Maul's thumb appeared. The turbulent darkness died down, and in its place was the dark and stormy ocean once more.
Maul felt the Force shift around him, and Obi-Wan felt it even more. Like a great weight had fallen upon this small world to then have Maul become the epicenter of the force that repulsed it. With its absence… Maul felt lighter. If he took a step, he could float off the ground.
Power, unlike any he had felt before, besides the gifts and lessons Tobi had given him, coursed through his veins.
The ball in his cupped hand grew in size as the darker than black orb became as big as Maul's head. All the light felt like it was being sucked into its darkness and drew everyone’s gaze to it.
Obi-Wan's eyes turned to pinpricks at the sight, and the suffocating feeling of the dark side encompassed everything. Obi-Wan could feel the cold sensation as if death itself had a grip on his spine, sending chills along it.
The darkness was suffocating, a metaphysical shadow that drowned everything in it. A flood of darkness unlike anything Obi-Wan had ever felt before. He thought he had seen and felt all the dark side could do. This made those thoughts dry up like water on Geonosis.
Maul, with the orb in hand, kept the power of nearly pure destruction contained within the orb, all his meditations and ponderings of the Force and its mysteries had culminated in this moment. This was the first time he had managed to successfully generate his own Shadow Ball…
But it wasn’t a Shadow Ball. Maul knew this because it looked not only different but also felt fundamentally different from Tobi’s move. Even if he couldn’t feel him use the Force, long since accepting Tobi willingly severed his connection to it, which was something Maul could never bring himself to do.
But the technique was something Maul had become infatuated with and had Tobi help him in trying to grasp and understand it. He attempted to copy it. He had no delusions that it would be a perfect copy the first time around, but Maul quickly realized this wasn’t Tobi’s Shadow Ball.
It looked vaguely similar, but he could feel it. This was something new. Never seen before. Where Tobi’s crackled and felt like it was ready to unleash itself upon the world, the oddly calm orb held in the palm of his hand was still as calm water.
But Maul knew it was capable of so much destruction. Like an apex predator remaining at the bottom of a calm body of water ready to destroy anything that gets too close.
The walking tanks cannon was almost lined up and Kenobi was halfway to reaching Maul, the Force boosting him enough to move just fast enough to observe Maul's casual usage of thunder breathing.
He aimed his palm right at the walker sidestepping a wall of blaster bolts and his other hadn’t stopped for even a fraction of a second weaving his lightsaber through a complex series of motions.
The ball with a mental flex and the Force obeyed, it launched from his hand before Maul turned around to face Kenobi.
The ball zoomed forward, the air in front of it cleaved in two and parted before it like water against a flood gate. Before any of the clones could even react, reality itself seemed to shudder and break apart.
The dark orb remained in its fixed shape even when heavy blaster cannons from the AT-TE hit it. Instead of detonating like any blaster bolt normally would, the shots the instant they made contact with the small orb just vanished. Swallowed up by the small orb that raced towards the walking tank.
The instant the dark orb made contact it swiftly expanded. The bubble grew in size rapidly, yet Maul and even Obi-Wan paused eyes wide staring at the horrifying thing Maul had created. The moment the orb of pure darkness touched the front of the tank, the material regardless of what it was got chipped away and just annihilated.
The darkness devoured it all, the metal plating the tank was made from, blaster bolts, dirt and rock, even the air itself was devoured. It grew in size quickly taking the entire tank, then expanding out towards the rest of the clones as a wave of pure darkness hellbent on destroying everything in its path.
In a matter of seconds, it expanded to encompass nearly all the clones with the dome of darkness finally freezing in its tracks before it broke apart like shadows under the first rays of light from a star.
Chipped and eaten away at just as it had done to the area around it the darkness faded leaving a perfectly round crater with nothing left of the clones that couldn’t get away in time or the tank… Besides the few clones who were halfway in the darkness.
Their screams cut off once it touched and expanded over their bodies and everyone saw why. The three clones caught in it had portions of their bodies missing. The armor, flesh and blood, anything that was touched by it was simply gone. Half their bodies were gone, parts of legs, arms, even half of one’s head.
They finally moved as if time had resumed normally with a rush of air filling the vacuum left behind from the air itself getting destroyed. Maul remained planted on the ground, his control of both his own strength and the Force ensured the vacuum didn’t drag him into it.
Kenobi on the other hand…
The man grit his teeth before with a gesture of his hand another barrier was formed and kept the worst of the suction force away from him. He breathed heavily, drenched in a cold sweat after the great shadow that had plunged what felt like to him and anyone sensitive to the Force the entire planet in nothing but darkness. A tidal wave washing over everything.
Neither of the two even realized that every Force sensitive person in the galaxy now had their attention fully on this planet.
What was left of the dead clones bodies was dragged into the perfectly round hole with those left alive sucked in for good measure. Maul casually turned towards Obi-Wan and before the man could even react even with the Force helping him took a punch to the face.
Spit and blood flew from his mouth, staining the dirt. He tumbled back, seeing stars and black at the edge of his vision. Lightsaber knocked from his hands rolled beside him as he breathed and coughed before clarity broke through the curtain of pain. His eyes shot open and looked up.
Instead of a lightsaber about to end his life, Maul merely stood across from him. For most it would be considered a safe distance but Obi-Wan knew he could cross it before he could even get his lightsaber up. But the Force gave him no warning, not even from the punch.
It was difficult to feel anything. What was once calm had now become turbulent. Almost like the after shocks from an earthquake.
Then Mauls next words gave Obi-Wan pause.
“Whatever hatred I had for you is in the past now. If I do one day kill you, it’s not because of what happened between us, but because you got in my way and forced my hand. You will continue to live and do what you have already managed twice.” He turned and just started to walk away.
“What did I manage to do?” Obi-Wan asked what many on the Jedi Council would have seen as the worst question to get any kind of answer for.
Yet it was most the glaring one on the top of Kenobi’s mind.
“You managed to foil my former master's plans, on two different occasions without even being aware of it. The same master who orchestrated this war, not Tobi. Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant. Your continued survival and existence will help pave the way to his downfall.”
Before Obi-Wan could stop him or the clones that came to back him and the others up that followed him with Ahsoka leading the charge with Anakin, Maul just left.
A simple flex of his legs that were more like coiled lightning than flesh and blood and he just disappeared with a crack not unlike that of thunder. His form just disappeared into the distance heading in the direction of one of the large clone groups with droids advancing towards the Separatist flank.
Anakin and Ahsoka both looked worse for wear, but thankfully both were in one piece this time. Oddly enough Anakin appeared to be covered in sand of all things as it poured out of the creases and folds of his armor and uniform, even in his hair.
Anakin stared long and hard where Maul had just been standing, easily recognizing the man.
He turned to Obi-Wan helping him up and giving him a knowing look. “And to think that he is still alive isn’t the strangest thing we have seen.” Was all Anakin said to his former master.
