Written by James Luceno, 31/1/2012
Originally published in the 31st January 2012 printing of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.
As the shadow of the Trade Federation spreads over Naboo, a streak of darkness cuts through the Federation’s heart.
For Darth Sidious has sent his apprentice to oversee the annihilation of Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi, plunging the galaxy into war and announcing the presence of the Sith to the Jedi.
The balance between dark and light is on a precarious edge, and for Darth Maul, the beginning may actually be the end.
The Sith Infiltrator was in hyperspace when Darth Maul engaged the autopilot to give himself time to think. Reflection was so foreign to him that the impulse to look inward left him momentarily astonished—though not enough to keep him seated at the ship’s controls. Shrugging out of the acceleration chair’s harness, he rose and paced from the control console to the aft arc of passenger seats; then from the entrance of the lift to the power-cell array access panels. Though Tatooine was light-years behind him, he couldn’t shake the planet from his thoughts, and despite the Scimitar’s speed and cloaking ability, it was as if the sleek ship, too, were incapable of outracing the past.
If I had it to do over again…
In his thoughts he was dropped into the speeder bike’s open cockpit, racing across Tatooine’s desolate landscape; in the next moment, executing an impromptu though acrobatic leap that carried him to the yellow ground, his lightsaber in hand, its energy blade meeting that of the Jedi Master whose name he had since learned was Qui-Gon Jinn.
Probe droids Maul had dispatched upon landing on Tatooine had located the bearded human Jedi in the stands of the Podrace stadium and later in the settlement known as Mos Espa. One of the trio of Dark Eyes had also discovered the Queen of Naboo’s starship where it had put down in the wastes of the Xelric Draw. Intent on availing himself of every advantage, Maul had waited for Qui-Gon to set out on foot for the gleaming ship before launching his surprise attack. Qui-Gon and a human slave boy had hurried across the oven-like wastes while Maul watched from the padded comfort of the speeder’s seat. Maul’s eyes were better adapted than human eyes to the glare of Tatooine’s twin suns, his lithe body better suited than the Jedi heavyweight’s to fighting in soft sand …
And yet nothing had gone as planned.
Somehow Qui-Gon heard the sibilant whine of the speeder’s repulsorlift and had whirled aside at the last instant. With some 250 meters separating Qui-Gon and the slave boy from Queen Amidala’s vessel, Maul would have had time to whip the speeder through a turn and make a second pass. Instead, in his eagerness to face off at last with a celebrated Jedi lightsaber Master, he had leapt into action …
Qui-Gon’s shrewd readiness had almost taken Maul off his guard. But the first ferocious clash of their blades had told him that the Jedi was equally surprised. And why shouldn’t he be—about being attacked not only by a Dathomiri Zabrak who had appeared out of nowhere, but also by one trained in the dark arts and wielding a crimson-bladed lightsaber? Regardless, Qui-Gon had quieted his mind and brought his imposing might to bear against Maul’s agility. He had matched Maul’s furious strokes with a disciplined intensity all his own. In the midst of their no-quarter contest the Jedi had even managed to order the slave boy to flee for the safety of the waiting ship, where Maul had nearly forgotten all about him.
The Force favors this Jedi! Maul recalled thinking.
After all the droids, assassins, gangsters, and soldiers he had vanquished, finally a worthy opponent. Not since he had fought and been defeated by his own Master, Darth Sidious, had Maul been so committed to a challenge.
Then, just when Qui-Gon’s stamina was beginning to flag and the fight was tipping in Maul’s favor, the incomprehensible had occurred: Qui-Gon had fled. Instead of standing fast and fighting to the finish, he had bounded onto the lowered boarding ramp of the Royal Starship as it was lifting off, leaving Maul—sandblasted as much by disenchantment as raw anger—to watch the craft disappear into Tatooine’s blue sky.
Many a being had run from Maul, but never a worthy one.
When, on orders from his Master, he had single-handedly butchered the trainers and trainees at the Orsis combat academy five years earlier, not a being had fled. Not the Mandalorian Meltch nor his pair of lethal Rodians; not Trezza or his well-trained Nautolan ward, Kilindi. All had stood their ground and died with honor. Spinelessness was something that had never entered Maul’s imaginings. What, then, was he now supposed to think of the Jedi, whom he had been raised to hate since infancy?
On Coruscant, before leaving for Tatooine, Maul had found it impossible to contain his enthusiasm. At last we reveal ourselves, Master, he had said to Sidious. And in the end that long-awaited moment of revelation had led to nothing more than disappointment. Watching the departing starship, Maul had wondered: Could he succeed in tracking the Jedi and the Queen a second time? How would his failure impact the overall mission?
At the time he had tried to make excuses for himself, blaming his inability to overpower Qui-Gon on the leg wound he had sustained during his brief capture by Togorian pirates. Or the slave boy might have been to blame—a seeming nexus of Force energy, the boy had somehow abetted Qui-Gon in the fight. But Maul had known better than to make excuses to his Master, or even mention the run-in with the Togorians.
But if he had it to do over again, he wouldn’t make it a challenge.
Even if that meant depriving himself of the thrill of combat and the pleasure of seeing the pained surprise in Qui-Gon’s eyes when Maul’s blade pierced him. He would simply race in at top speed with his lightsaber already ignited and decapitate Qui-Gon Jinn where he stood. That way he might also have been able to pilot the speeder through the ship’s open hatch, kill Qui-Gon’s Padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and capture the Queen …
How his Master would have praised him then! Instead Maul had been forced to weather Sidious’s obvious disenchantment in abject humiliation. Darth Sidious had dismissed the setback, almost as if attributing Maul’s failure to—what? Surely not fate, since his Master was as much as overseeing that. That left only Maul’s lack of ability.
His weakness.
Currently the two Jedi, the Queen, and her entourage of handmaidens and protectors were on Coruscant, and Maul had been ordered to Naboo to assist the loathsome Neimoidians in rooting out possible pockets of resistance while Sidious modified the plan.
Even Sidious despised having to deal with the Neimoidians. So the assignment to advise them felt like a punishment, as had happened following Maul’s massacre of the leaders of the Black Sun crime syndicate. Then Maul had been banished from Coruscant after confessing to Sidious that he had identified himself as a Sith Lord to one of the crime bosses before killing him.
In previous missions undertaken for his Master, Maul had felt allied to the dark side, but something had changed since Tatooine. Was he now in some sense engaging the Force itself, through its proxies, the Jedi? Should he have been more circumspect and lured the Jedi to him instead of initiating the attack?
Would his Master even allow him a second chance?
He wouldn’t have believed that his hatred for the Jedi could deepen, but it had—for making him appear ineffectual in the eyes of Darth Sidious and for putting him in such an untenable fix …
Enough thinking, Maul commanded himself.
The solution was that he couldn’t allow himself to fail again.
Convinced that he had put the past to rest, Maul came to a halt in the Infiltrator’s cabin. However, as if his legs had a will of their own, he was suddenly back in motion, pacing from the control console to the acceleration chairs.
If I had it to do over again…
* * *
Holoimages of Naboo didn’t do it justice.
A blue-green gem in an otherwise lackluster star system, the planet was one of the most pristine Maul had ever seen. This was as it should be, being the homeworld of Darth Sidious in his guise as Senator—perhaps soon to be Supreme Chancellor—Palpatine. Years earlier Maul had fallen prey to a plot that would have returned him to the world of his birth, Dathomir, but he had foiled the designs of his Nightsister abductors and pledged never to give thought to the life he might have led had he not been raised and trained by Sidious. As far as he was concerned, his homeworld was volcanic Mustafar, where he had fittingly been forged in fire.
Integral to his Master’s plan, the Trade Federation’s blockade of Naboo had been in the works for several years. The plan had required positioning Viceroy Nute Gunray as director of the shipping cartel, and manipulating the Republic Senate into allowing the Neimoidians to defend the enormous ships of their fleet with combat automata and other war machines. But the Senate had yet to learn the lengths to which the Trade Federation had gone to arm itself. The blockade had been in effect for some time when Sidious had ordered the Neimoidians to invade and occupy the planet, in response to the Jedi Order’s attempt to intervene in the dispute. Attempts had been made on the lives of Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi, but the Neimoidians had proved no match for the Jedi, and so the Forceful duo had managed to spirit Queen Amidala safely off Naboo.
The blockade had initially numbered hundreds of vessels, but Maul realized on arriving at Naboo that the Neimoidians—ever fretful about diminished profits—had since returned almost all of their ships to the business of intergalactic transport. Well, they were nothing more than merchants, he reminded himself, but their greediness offended him almost as much as Qui-Gon’s cowardice.
At Tatooine it hadn’t been necessary to employ the Scimitar’s cloaking capabilities, but Maul did so now in order to maneuver the ship into the core of what remained of the Trade Federation armada, which consisted of half a dozen freighters and a single ring-shaped Lucrehulk-class control ship, which oversaw all elements of the Neimoidians’ droid army. Though formidable, the control ship was not impregnable, and the shoddiness of the operation sickened him. A stealth team made up of agents of the sort Trezza had trained on Orsis would have been able to infiltrate the vessel easily and destroy it from within, essentially paralyzing the Trade Federation’s entire force.
Maul was certain he could penetrate the ship on his own, and was sorely tempted to, if only to rub Gunray’s muzzled face in the flaws of his strategy. But he contented himself with piloting the Infiltrator to well within firing range of the control ship and a squadron of drone starfighters, without the Neimoidians even being aware of his presence.
* * *
Maul took the Scimitar through a low and slow orbit around Naboo, studying aerial close-ups of the northern continent’s grassy flatlands, lush hills, and extensive swamps and lakes. The galaxy boasted many such scenic wonders, but what made Naboo unique—and had in some sense doomed it—was the planet’s plasma core, and the maze of underground tunnels and caverns the seething magma had fashioned. Those corridors, however, were not visible from above, save for various entry points to underground oceans that were allegedly rife with behemoth aquatic creatures, and home to an indigenous species of amphibian humanoids who resided in bubble cities maintained by plasma technology.
Once Darth Sidious had issued the command to invade Naboo, the assault and subsequent occupation had happened quickly—in part because of Queen Amidala’s unwillingness to fight back. Not, in any case, that Naboo’s small space force would have stood a chance against the Trade Federation army. Amidala may have been convinced that the Neimoidians were bluffing—which they certainly would have been without the goading of a Sith Lord—but even when the first landing ships had begun to disgorge antigrav tanks and thousands of infantry droids, the young Queen had ordered the Naboo Royal Security Forces to stand down and surrender. Only Viceroy Gunray’s concern for the Trade Federation’s galactic reputation had kept the invasion from turning into a slaughter. And only a fluke had allowed Amidala’s starship to breach the blockade.
Maul flew the invisible ship over several sprawling makeshift detention centers, where the entire populations of some of Naboo’s compact cities were now imprisoned and forced to answer to battle droids. Employing coordinates furnished by Darth Sidious, he set the Scimitar down outside the principal city of Theed, in a private hangar Sidious had assured him was secure.
Maul used his wrist link to program his trio of probe droids to monitor the hangar, then extracted the horseshoe-shaped speeder bike from its proprietary enclosure in the underside of the forward port-side cargo hatch. Clothed in black robes and a hooded field cloak, he straddled the speeder and aimed it for Theed.
The deserted city of stately domes and elegant spires struck him as an artifact—or perhaps a quaint historical replica closed for routine maintenance. Squads of B1 battle droids armed with blaster rifles patrolled the narrow streets and stood sentry outside the Theed Palace and other major buildings. Evading them effortlessly, Maul timed the patrols, made note of their numbers, and used the Force to create sounds that tricked the droids into moving in one direction or another. The idea of using droids as combatants annoyed him, for droids were only as good as their programming, and the bipedal, slender-headed B1 had limited skills and no ability to perform autonomously. Only the fact that the droids, too, were integral to his Master’s more far-reaching plan kept Maul from revulsion. The deeper he ventured into the galaxy, the less honor he found.
But the Sith would redress that deficit once the Jedi were exterminated and the Republic brought down.
Maul stowed the speeder in an alley that ran alongside Theed’s space force hangar, which was perched on the edge of an escarpment. Inside the domed building he took stock of Naboo’s smart yellow-and-chromium Nubian fighters, neatly arranged in berths on several tiers, with an R2 astromech droid assigned to each ship. Despite the success of the occupation, the Neimoidians would have been wise to disable the fighters, but they were apparently incapable of tampering with anything of value. As with the control ship, Maul was tempted to show them the error of their ways, but again he did nothing.
Emerging from the hangar, he allowed himself to be detected and confronted by a patrol of droids. In a metallic voice, their officer unit ordered him to halt and raised its E-5 rifle. Reared by Darth Sidious’s custodial droids on Mustafar, Maul—for many years—had had a complex relationship with droids of any sort. Certainly his fascination with technology owed in part to the circumstances of his abnormal upbringing, but he had no compunction about destroying droids when the need arose, whether in training sessions or on missions. Still, he derived no enduring satisfaction from the contests, even when combating the most sophisticated among them.
Calling his long lightsaber to his hand, he made short work of the squad, decapitating them with his blade or exploding them by deflecting blaster bolts back at them. The brief altercation drew several more patrols, the members of which he similarly dismembered. Then he went on the hunt for a red-emblazoned security unit, and when he found one he clamped his gloved hands around the thing’s canted neck and ordered it to establish contact with Viceroy Gunray. When the droid became unresponsive he snapped its head off and used it as he might a comlink, demanding that the Neimoidian technician with whom he eventually spoke relay the communication directly to Gunray.
After a long moment, a patronizing voice issued from the battle droid’s vocoder.
“Lord Maul,” Gunray said, “we were not aware that you had arrived.”
“Of course you weren’t,” Maul growled.
“How may we be of service?”
Maul squeezed the head so tightly, it began to fold in on itself.
“You can begin by making certain that every droid on Naboo responds to me as its chief commander, Viceroy. Or I will reduce this fine army of yours to a mountain of scrap.”
* * *
Maul paced the polished stone floor of the Theed Palace throne room in brooding silence, his lightsaber affixed to the black leather cummerbund that cinched his robes. Draped in shimmersilk, Nute Gunray and his green-skinned diplomatic attaché, Rune Haako, stood alongside each other before a tall, arch-topped window, wringing their thick-fingered hands. A silver protocol droid attended them, and a mechno-chair awaited the viceroy’s pleasure.
“Several members of the Queen’s Security Forces managed to elude our battle droids,” Gunray was saying in wheedling Basic. “They rescued a group of Naboo captives, and caused us some concern on an orbital station and at one of our plasma transhipment sites on the surface. Fortunately for us—and unfortunately for them—the Naboo fell in with a visiting Hutt who happens to be in our employ. He betrayed their plans and location.”
“They’re dead or imprisoned?” Maul stopped to ask.
“The captain is dead. Some of the others are still at large.”
Maul resumed his angry pacing. He was familiar with both Neimoidians from holotransmissions conducted between them and Darth Sidious during the past year. They had dealt with Sidious from across cold space, but now, confronted with a flesh-and-blood Sith Lord, it was all they could do to keep from trembling in awe. A musky, low-tide odor wafted from Haako, who affected purple robes and a horned bonnet.
“And the Gungans?” Maul said.
The pair traded baffled looks. “What of them, Lord Maul?” Haako asked.
“You’ve located their underwater cities and taken the necessary steps?”
“We’re … in the process,” Gunray said. A three-tined tiara crowned his mottled blue face.
“How many have you captured?”
The nictitating membrane of Gunray’s red eyes spasmed. “How many?”
“Hundreds? Thousands?”
The viceroy improvised. “On the order of hundreds, I should think.”
Maul was revolted by the fact that he was in some measure responsible for Gunray’s lofty position, having executed missions that had elevated Gunray from a mere functionary to a being of galactic import. But Darth Sidious maintained that the Neimoidians were necessary to the Sith’s Grand Plan, and part of that plan called for Naboo to be secured, in preparation for the planet being annexed by the shipping cartel. With Queen Amidala on Coruscant, Naboo’s surrender was not yet official, but Maul was certain that his Master would find a way to bring it about.
“Where are the Gungan captives?” Maul said.
Again the Neimoidians glanced at each other. They knew that Maul had already killed their treacherous confederate, Hath Monchar, and grasped that he would kill again if provoked.
Gunray spoke first. “The corpses were dumped into the sea—”
“—atomized,” Haako said at the same time.
Maul showed each of them a withering glance. “Which is it—dumped or atomized?”
“Atomized, then dumped into the sea,” Gunray said, proud of himself.
Maul continued to glower at him. “You discarded atomized bodies.”
The air went out of Gunray for a moment; then he said: “The Gungans need not concern us.”
Maul folded his arms across his chest and bared his filed teeth. “Why is that, Viceroy?”
“The amphibians would not risk engaging our overwhelming force.”
Maul snorted. “The Gungans have a standing army thousands strong and strategic plasma weaponry.”
Gunray looked at Haako, who said, “We didn’t know—”
“Now you do.”
Maul watched the slimy duo shake in their robes. These were invaders? These were the leaders of an army? So easily cowed, so easily deceived, and covetous to the point that they had allowed themselves to be manipulated into instigating a war for a chance at increased profits. To them, wealth was an end unto itself. They had no understanding of real power, and seemingly no contact with the Force. They had more in common with the battle droids that served them than they had with sentient beings. How Trezza would have laughed. Sometimes Maul lamented having had to kill the Falleen. But Trezza had learned too much about Maul’s powers …
“Who is supervising the search for the Gungan cities?” he said at last.
“Commander OOM-Nine,” Gunray said.
“A droid,” Maul said. “The predecessor of your inept B-Ones.”
“A superior droid, Lord Maul,” Haako was quick to point out. “Viceroy Gunray’s personal guard.”
Maul ignored him and spoke to Gunray. “Inform OOM-Nine that I am assuming command of the search.”
* * *
Maul demanded the most from the speeder bike as he left the plains and the Gallo Mountains behind and raced down through dense forest and into the swamplands to the south. Before leaving Theed he had communicated with Darth Sidious; he had reason to believe that the mistakes he’d made on Tatooine had been forgiven, and that his mission was back on track. With the Republic Senate in turmoil, Sidious was confident that he would be able to persuade Queen Amidala to return to Naboo, and he suspected that Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi would accompany her. But Maul’s excitement at the prospect of having a second go at them was dimmed by having to deal with the Gungans—business that had been entrusted to the Neimoidians. Surely Sidious knew that Gunray was incapable of doing what had been asked of him, and yet Sidious had kept vital information from the viceroy that would have enabled him to locate the underwater cities of the indigenes. Why, then, had Sidious provided the information to Maul now? Was this yet another in the series of tests his Master had put him through over the past five years to substantiate his loyalty and skill?
The question rode with him into the forward observation base OOM-9 had established on the shore of an insect-plagued marsh. The forest was tall here, and the slender trees seemed to grow from the fetid water itself. In a clearing, a full company of battle droids waited in precise ranks, augmented by a dozen droidekas. Other droids were scouting the marsh on Single Trooper Aerial Platforms. Close to the shore hovered a clamshell-shaped aquatic destroyer equipped with arrays of short-range lasers and tank-like siege engines.
Maul was impressed. The scene at least had the appearance of a legitimate military exercise.
OOM-9 approached as he was dismounting the speeder bike. “Welcome, Commander,” it said in a forthright way.
Its chest plastron emblazoned with yellow markings, OOM-9 boasted multiple antennae and a backpack that boosted its operational range. Maul knew that the droid had been tasked with spearheading the occupation and was credited with having razed Naboo communications centers at New Centrif and Vis, as well as having secured the cities of Harte Secur, Spinnaker, and Theed. From a captured mariner in Harte Secur, OOM-9 had learned of a Gungan bubble city called Rellias, but its forces had thus far been unable to locate the city.
“Viceroy Gunray said that you have already captured many Gungans,” Maul said. “Exactly how many?”
The droid’s processor hummed faintly as it communicated with computers aboard the orbiting control ship. “How many did the viceroy say we captured?” it asked in a grating monotone.
“Forty-seven,” Maul told it.
“Yes, Commander. We captured forty-seven.”
Maul frowned in exasperation, but forgave OOM-9 the lie. “Show me to them.”
The droid pivoted through a half circle and turned its thin head back toward Maul. “This way, Commander.”
A short winding trail through the trees led to a place where four Gungans were laid out on the ground, their cartilaginous bodies holed by blaster bolts. With their billed faces, floppy ears, stalked eyes, and lolling tongues, they certainly didn’t look capable of waging war, but Sidious had warned Maul not to underestimate the species.
“These Gungans were apprehended while exchanging goods with Naboo traders outside the city of Moenia,” OOM-9 explained.
“Where are the Naboo traders?”
“Confined in Detention Camp Six, Commander.”
Maul took a moment to observe a STAP patrol buzzing overhead. “You’ve found no signs of Rellias?”
“None, Commander. It’s possible that the Gungans have devices capable of foiling our penetrating scanners.”
Maul considered it. However slight, there was a chance the Gungans were capable of doing something that could jeopardize his task of killing the Jedi and capturing the Queen, and he couldn’t have that.
“This isn’t the time for subtlety,” he told OOM-9. “Poison the waters. If that doesn’t bring the Gungans to the surface, then drain the marsh.”
* * *
Maul took the speeder bike out of the lowlands, following a twisting path that climbed back into the lush foothills of the Gallo range. Farms began to appear, with stately old houses set far back from the roadbed. Reasoning that revolt of any sort would likely begin in one of the cities, the Neimoidians hadn’t sent their droids into the area. But clearly the Naboo farmers were aware of what had happened elsewhere, as many of the houses were abandoned, and agricultural machines sat silently in the midst of furrowed fields.
Eventually Maul located the place Sidious had told him to seek out. Posted where the roadbed intersected the lane that accessed the house, a sign written in Basic and Futhork read: SUMMIT FARM BLOSSOM WINERY. Maul waited at the sign. East and west of the lane as far as he could see spread field after field of cultivated plants, their vibrant flowers varying in color, size, and shape. The warm air was redolent with their heady fragrances. Maul swung the speeder bike over the lane and moved slowly toward the house. In some of the fields, Naboo men working alongside labor droids stopped what they were doing to watch him pass. One man set off in a run for the house, clearly to announce Maul’s arrival.
The house was a well-cared-for building made of wood and stone, with a quaint peaked roof. Some distance from the house, two ancient windmills spun. In an outbuilding larger than the house, Maul could see extraction presses and wooden storage barrels. He had just brought the speeder to a halt when a short Naboo woman exited through the house’s front door, wiping her hands on a work apron and appraising him openly. As sturdily built as her house, the woman had sharp features, piercing blue eyes, and close-cropped silver hair. The muscular worker who had tipped her off lingered behind, his posture indicating that he had a blaster tucked into the waistband of his pants, at the small of his back. Maul brought his left leg over the speeder’s U-shaped saddle and stood for a moment, allowing the woman to study him while he peeled off his long black gloves and draped them over the steering bar.
“You’ve ridden a long way,” she said. “You must be thirsty. Come inside.”
She turned and walked back into the house. Her protector stepped away, allowing Maul to pass before following him inside. The interior was cool and dim and decorated with wooden furniture and other old things. The woman returned from a food preparation area and handed Maul a clear drink cooled by crushed ice. He took a small sip, testing it for poison, then drank the sweet liquid down in one long pull while the woman traded furtive glances with her bodyguard. With a nod of her pointed chin, she signaled the man to leave the room, but he didn’t go far.
When Maul handed her the empty glass, she gestured to a couch.
“Sit down, won’t you? And tell me what I can do for you.”
Maul didn’t move. “I need location coordinates for the principal Gungan cities.”
She blinked in surprise. “Who told you I have information of that sort?”
“Do you or don’t you?”
She narrowed her eyes in understanding and showed him a fleeting, tight-lipped smile. “I knew the Neimoidians couldn’t have pulled off something like this on their own. How long have you been working with the Trade Federation?”
Maul glowered. “The Gungan cities.”
“I’m afraid you’ve come all this way for nothing.” Seeing the fire in Maul’s yellow eyes, she quickly added: “Now, hold on a moment. Just because I don’t know the coordinates, doesn’t mean I don’t know someone who does.”
“Who?” Maul snapped.
She sat down on the couch. “First things first. Just how much do you know about me—or think you know?”
Maul stood over her. “Your name is Magneta. You were chief of security for the former King.”
She forced a short exhale. “I’d ask your name, but I’m sure it wouldn’t mean anything to me.”
Maul went on. “Before the election of Queen Amidala, the King was planning to tap additional plasma reservoirs in the Gungan areas. He contracted with an offworld mining company to do the surveys, and was prepared to go to war with the Gungans if they resisted. He abdicated the throne before putting the plan into action.”
“Abdicated,” Magneta said, drawing out the word. “A curious way to put it. Do you know how King Veruna died?”
Maul fought to control his impatience. “I don’t know and I don’t care.”
She studied his face. “Odd. When you rode up, I immediately figured you for the assassin we could never locate.”
Maul snorted. “You figured wrong. Who knows the location of the underwater cities?”
Magneta sighed. “All right, have it your way. You’ll want to talk to a Bothan named Leika. He’s chief surveyor for the company King Veruna hired. But I’m not sure where he can be found. I’ve tried to keep an ear to the ground, but from here there’s only so much I’m able to learn. Leika was preparing to leave Naboo when the Neimoidians sprang their surprise blockade. He tried to reason with them, but as with many other offworlders, he wasn’t permitted to leave. No ships in or out, no exceptions. He was in Moenia when the invasion occurred, and no doubt he was caught up in it. So the first place I’d look would be in the closest detention camps.”
Maul turned and headed for the door. He was about to go through it when Magneta said: “Be sure to give my regards to the Muun.”
Maul stopped and swung slowly around. “What Muun?”
“Hego Damask.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know the name.”
Magneta tipped her head to one side in suspicion. “I find that very unlikely, since I’m certain that Hego Damask and his puppet—Naboo’s illustrious Senator Palpatine—have their arms to the elbows in this invasion and occupation.”
Maul betrayed no surprise, even at the mention of his Master’s alias. “Who is Hego Damask?”
“Who is …?” Magneta ran her eyes over his mask of a face. “You actually don’t know? Damask is a mobster masquerading as a banker. It was Damask who brokered the original deal to have Naboo’s plasma mined and shipped by the Trade Federation. I suspect he’s also the one behind Palpatine’s campaign for the chancellorship. They’ve been in collusion for over two decades.”
Maul was secretly stunned. He knew the names of some of Palpatine’s cohorts—Sate Pestage, Kinman Doriana, and others—but the name Hego Damask was new to him, as was Magneta’s assertion that the Muun was in some way controlling Palpatine. Was it possible that Darth Sidious himself had a clandestine Master? The idea was too far-fetched to contemplate, let alone accept.
“Ah, so I have touched on something,” Magneta said, watching him closely. “Then you might as well know the rest: There’s good reason to believe that Damask and Palpatine were the ones responsible for King Veruna’s death. They needed to install pretty little Amidala on the throne so they could take full control of the planet, while making it seem as if the Trade Federation were responsible.”
She paused, then added: “Palpatine double-crossed me, even after I allowed his agent, Pestage, to get away with the murder of more than a dozen pro-Gungan Naboo.” She gestured broadly. “Instead of being taken into the fold, I end up here, in humiliated self-exile for failing to save Veruna’s life.”
Maul knew something about humiliation. But Magneta had gone too far in airing her grievances, however justified. Palpatine could not be suspected of being tied to the Neimoidians or to the invasion of Naboo.
Maul heard Magneta’s bodyguard move, and Magneta, too—going for a hold-out blaster concealed beneath her apron. Maul was also aware that several field workers were gathered just outside the door, waiting to spring an ambush.
Snarling, he whirled, moving faster than human eyes could follow, breaking Magneta’s neck with the edge of his hand, then spinning again to send his stiffened right foot into the chest of the bodyguard as he rushed into the room. A hail of blaster bolts came through the front door.
Dodging them, Maul ran across the room and dived headfirst through a window, somersaulting in midair so that he hit the ground on his feet, now centered among his astonished opponents.
Growling, he clenched his bare hands and set on them, killing one after another.
* * *
Battle droids stationed at the perimeter of Detention Camp Six, outside Moenia, brandished their blaster rifles as Maul sped into their midst on the speeder bike. He was a split second from cutting them to pieces when their recognition programs kicked in and they assumed postures of salute.
“Welcome, Commander Maul,” their officer intoned. “What are your orders?”
Shoving past them, Maul crossed a footbridge that spanned a foul-smelling trench and entered a compound of hastily erected dormitories and flat-roofed dining halls. The area had been recently deforested, and Naboo’s sun beat down on the muddy ground. The relocated population of nearby Moenia was largely made up of artists, merchants, and Gungan sympathizers. Maul supposed that they were more accustomed to simple living than their counterparts in cosmopolitan Theed, who had never known privation, but they were an unhappy lot just the same. A droid administrator found the name Leika among the list of detainees, and a security droid escorted Maul to a dormitory the Bothan surveyor shared with twenty Naboo actors, a Rodian wilderness guide, and two Bith musicians.
A broad-nosed and bearded being of medium height, Leika went rigid with fright on seeing Maul enter the room and made straight for the cot he shared with one of the Naboo.
Maul stood akimbo at the foot of the cot. “Gather your belongings and follow me outside.”
“I—”
“Now!”
Over his hirsute shoulders the Bothan slung two small backpacks and hurried after Maul, who ushered him into an unoccupied storage building and closed the door behind them.
“I didn’t mean to be a bother to the viceroy,” Leika said in apology. “I was merely requesting permission to leave Naboo—”
“That doesn’t concern me.”
The Bothan frowned in confusion. “You are the Neimoidians’ executioner, are you not?”
“That depends on how much information you can provide regarding the location of the Gungan cities,” Maul said.
Leika’s eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed with clear purpose. “If you can get me off Naboo, I’ll provide whatever information you require.”
Maul glanced at the backpacks. “First show me what you have, then I’ll give thought to your predicament.”
The Bothan dug into the smaller of the packs and fished out a projection crystal, which he inserted into a reader and set atop a storage container. Activated, the reader projected a 3-D map of Naboo’s swamplands and lakes.
“It took me more than a year to assemble these data,” Leika said. “I should have abandoned the project when King Veruna died, but I was so obsessed with unraveling the mystery of the Gungan cities, I couldn’t bring myself to stop. I was beginning to make real progress when the Trade Federation announced its blockade, and most of my informants went to ground.”
“Rellias,” Maul said. “Begin with that.”
Leika made adjustments to the crystal reader, and a new 3-D map came into view. He pointed to a data entry that accompanied shifting views of a dense cluster of hydrostatic bubbles that made up the underwater city of Rellias.
“Here are the location coordinates.” His furry hand moved. “The bubbles are permeable at certain points, and emit a natural glow that derives from the interaction between plasma and energy generated electromagnetically.”
“The name of the governor of Rellias,” Maul said.
“Boss,” Leika amended. “Boss Ganne. An Ankura Gungan—the ones with green skin and hooded eyes.”
Maul filed the name away. “How far to the bubble city closest to Rellias?”
Leika rocked his head back and forth. “Hard to say. Several of my sources confirmed that there is a fortified underwater plasma channel, somewhere in this area”—his forefinger drew a circle in the air—“that eventually leads to Otoh Gunga, Langua, Jahai, and the rest, which I believe to be in Lake Paonga, close to where it merges with the Lianorm Swamp. Otoh Gunga is the capital, if you will, and home to the Rep Council and the high ruler, Boss Rugor Nass. There is said to be a second approach to Otoh Gunga from the north, from a site called the Sacred Place.”
Maul turned away from the projected map to regard Leika. “The Sacred Place?”
The Bothan shrugged. “No one I spoke with knew why it’s called that, or precisely where it is.” He paused for a moment. “Are you … planning to attack the cities? I only ask because I feel compelled to warn you that the Gungans are well armed. Their standing army is what kept King Veruna from attacking them, and in part the impetus for his creating the Naboo Royal Space Fighter Corps. That, and to counter the strength of the Trade Federation.”
“And to counter the power of the Muun, Hego Damask,” Maul said, dangling the name.
If Leika was surprised, he kept it to himself. “Well, Magister Damask, of course. He controls all of it. Even the coming election on Coruscant.”
“Damask will put Senator Palpatine in power?” Maul asked carefully.
“Naboo’s favorite son?” Leika laughed shortly. “Hasn’t Damask already done so?”
Maul didn’t want to hear any more about it. Snatching the data crystal and reader, he threw open the door and stepped into the light. Glancing at Leika, he said: “The terms will be honored.”
As he made his way out of the detention camp he thought about Darth Sidious, and it occurred to him to wonder if the terms of their agreement would be honored.
* * *
By the time Maul returned to OOM-9’s forward observation base, the dark waters of the marshland were clotted with poisoned gooberfish, and a stench hung in the humid air. The water level was lower, but not nearly as low as Maul had expected.
“As quickly as we drain it, the marsh replenishes itself, Commander,” the droid told him. “The marsh and the lakes beyond appear to be linked to vast reserves of underground water.”
Maul handed the data crystal to OOM-9. “The location coordinates for Rellias can be accessed from the menu. Transmit the data to your STAP patrols and order them to saturate the location with depth charges. Then prepare the S-DST for immediate embarkation and meet me on board.”
The droid accepted the crystal and hurried off.
Carrying half the company of droid troopers and the full contingent of droidekas, the aquatic destroyer hovered through a maze of channels shaded by thriving forest. By midafternoon it had maneuvered its way into a twisting passage that provided a link between the marsh and an enormous clear-water lake. Far to the west, two fingers of land jutted into the lake, forming a strait. Standing in the destroyer’s curved bow, Maul could see the STAPs buzzing back and forth beyond the narrows, raining explosives on the water. As the muffled reports of the depth charges reached him, he tried to compose himself for battle, but a welter of thoughts kept him from clearing his mind entirely.
Years earlier, on the same day Maul had been ordered to execute everyone at Trezza’s combat training center on Orsis, Darth Sidious had revealed that he was a Sith Lord. Before that, Maul had had no idea why or for what purpose he was being trained in the ways of the Force and in the dark side. Following the massacre, Darth Sidious had revealed more information about the Sith, including the fact that, for a millennium, there had never been more than two true Sith in any one era, a Master and an apprentice. Allegedly. Now, in the wake of the revelations about his Master’s possible alliance with Hego Damask, Maul asked himself: Had Sidious ever described himself as the only surviving Sith Master? Was it possible that this mysterious Muun, Hego Damask, was also a Sith Lord, and that Maul—while given the title lord by Sidious—was in fact something less than a true Sith? Was that why, unlike Sidious, he had never been granted a secret identity comparable to his Master’s guise as Palpatine? Was Maul, then, ultimately expendable to the Sith Grand Plan—a mere stealth agent and assassin?
Enough thinking! he told himself.
Simply all the more reason to prove himself to his Master—or possibly Masters. To demonstrate his worthiness so that he might be seen as a true Sith.
With the S-DST approaching the straits, Maul saw that stone fortifications had been erected on both fingers of land, and that from behind those bulwarks, spheres of faintly blue energy were being lobbed into the sky, decimating the STAP patrols. As the destroyer drew closer to the sandy shore, hundreds of orange- and purple-skinned Otolla Gungans appeared at the top of the walls, armed with energy lances and so-called plasmic boomers that could be hurled from baskets worn over one hand. Surfacing from the suddenly turbulent waters came a fleet of organically grown submersibles, whose weapons began to target the destroyer with orbs of destructive power.
The S-DST beached itself so that the droid troopers and droidekas could disembark. Rushing in to meet the hovercraft came a cavalry force made up of Gungans seated on two-legged wingless reptavians adorned with war feathers. Leading the charge were two green-skinned Ankura whom Maul assumed were Boss Ganne and his general. From the rear flew energy orbs launched from catapults strapped to the backs of beasts, whose sonorous calls reverberated across the lake. Battle droids marched out to face them, firing their E-5s continuously, and bolstered by the droidekas that wheeled toward the yelping riders, stopping only to fire from behind their individual deflector shields.
Maul leapt ashore. The horizontal hail of fire from the battle droids and the droidekas heated the air and conjured a breeze. STAPs fell from the sky like stones, and the energy spheres fountained water and dirt high into the air.
In planning his attack on the Orsis training camp, he had initially decided that his first kill should be Trezza. The Falleen had to be taken out while Maul was at the peak of his strength. Then the rest of the trainers and trainees could be seen to. But Maul hadn’t stood by his decision, undermined by reluctance to kill the being who had in many ways been his only flesh-and-blood caregiver. As a consequence, he had come close to losing to Trezza when they had finally joined in hand-to-hand combat. Maul had promised himself that he wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. Mistakes were part of the past—mere lessons like those he had learned on Tatooine—and he knew what had to be done now.
Maul gazed into the sky, where only a few STAPs remained. The aerial platforms answered solely to their droid pilots, but he thought of a way to make use of them. Summoning one, Maul launched himself into the air with a Force jump as the STAP soared overhead. Dangling from the platform’s starboard footrest with one hand, he called his lightsaber to the other, and ignited its blades.
Some of the Gungan riders saw him coming and took aim. Maul twisted his body, either evading flights of energy lances and spheres or fending them off with the lightsaber. Letting go of the STAP when he was still twenty meters from Ganne and the general, he called on the Force to send himself tearing through a score of mounted Gungans. It was clear that they had never seen anything like him. But then, who had? What Sith in the past thousand years had been allowed to wield a lightsaber in open battle? Was that in itself not enough to qualify him as a true Sith?
The rubbery Gungans all but disintegrated at the touch of the twin blades Maul had hoped to reserve for the Jedi. Their billed heads flew in all directions. His slashes halved them down the middle or through the midsection, and they squawked as they died. Their nostrils flared and their eyes bulged from their heads, and the white sand beach grew puddled with their blood. Maul maneuvered closer to Ganne, cutting the legs out from under the Gungans’ mounts or impaling them on his lightsaber.
He launched himself into the air when he was still five meters from the Boss and the general. The latter lost his head to one of the blades, and Ganne was knocked from his mount by Maul’s extended left hand. Agile despite his girth, the Gungan Boss clambered to his feet and scrambled for his electropole, but Maul was on him before he could use the weapon, disarming him and hauling him by his long ears through the chaos of the melee, into the tree line that defined the edge of the battlefield.
The Gungan’s hooded eyes rolled around in his head, and spittle drooled from his thick lips. Maul brought the lightsaber close to Ganne’s face, but then deactivated it. This weak-willed primitive didn’t need to be threatened, he told himself. He simply needed to be manipulated into revealing the truth.
“The route to Otoh Gunga,” Maul said, motioning meaningfully with his gloved hand.
Responding to the Force suggestion, Ganne’s eyes grew even blanker. “Yousa needen to be knowen desa ways to Otoh Gunga,” he said in the Gungan’s pidgin tongue.
“Tell me,” Maul said.
“Mesa tell yousa. Yousa take yous mackineeks through da Rellias Straits.”
Maul yanked Ganne’s ears behind his head. “You’ll open the gates when we arrive.”
“Mesa open dissa gates when wesa riven.”
Satisfaction and loathing mixed in Maul’s malicious grin. Hauling Ganne to his three-toed feet, he began dragging him toward Trade Federation lines.
* * *
Information provided by the obedient but confused Gungan Boss allowed the Trade Federation S-DST to maneuver safely through the treacherous Rellias Straits and into the much larger Lake Paonga. No sooner did it arrive than parties of Gungan warriors began to appear on the shores to bombard the hovercraft with plasma boomers. Maul put a quick end to the attacks by securing Boss Ganne to the craft’s curved bow. The sight of Ganne made to serve as a figurehead gave the warriors pause, and for the remainder of the journey to Otoh Gunga, the Gungans did little more than brandish their electropoles and give voice to war cries.
With the STAPs annihilated, OOM-9 commanded the battle droids to sow the lake with depth charges, some of which touched off underwater explosions that transformed the formerly placid lake into an expanse of frothing turmoil. But no Gungan bodies were observed among the objects the explosions brought to the surface. Even before OOM-9’s drone submersibles returned from their scouting missions, Maul realized that word of the invasion and fall of Rellias had spread quickly to Otoh Gunga, and the city had been evacuated. Gazing north over the chaotic waters, he asked himself where Boss Rugor Nass could be hiding. Then he stormed to the bow of the hovercraft to haul a sodden Boss Ganne onto the forward deck.
Motioning again with one hand, Maul interrogated him. This time, however, consternation warped the features of the Gungan’s broad face. Even if Ganne wanted to divulge the answers, something inside him was battling the compulsion to betray the Gungans’ most deeply held secret.
Maul snorted. Maybe not so primitive, after all.
And from his cummerbund he drew the lightsaber and thumbed it to life.
Ganne’s disclosures came slowly and painfully, but not without honor.
OOM-9 waited until Maul had rolled the Gungan’s blistered body into the water to say: “Commander, Viceroy Gunray wishes you to be informed that a holotransmission has been received from Coruscant. Queen Amidala and the Jedi are on their way to Naboo.”
* * *
Maul raced back to Theed, riding low and cutting a livid swath through the grasslands. Gunray and Haako had secreted themselves in the Palace throne room, but the security droids snapped to attention on seeing Maul and allowed him to enter. Instead of being grateful to Darth Sidious for having persuaded Queen Amidala to return to Naboo, the Neimoidians were rueful—sorrier than ever to have been drawn into a conspiracy with a Sith Lord. Maul knew that they would change their tune once the Queen ceded control of Naboo to the Trade Federation, but they lacked vision. Maul had to chase them from the throne room and out into Theed’s deserted central plaza, where he began to advise them on how to prepare for Amidala’s homecoming.
“You can start by stationing more droids around the Palace,” he said, “and ordering the patrols to sweep the area every five minutes instead of every fifteen.”
Haako tried to argue that Theed would be better protected if the patrols were widely dispersed, but Maul refused to sanction it. “You may think you have everyone rounded up in the camps, but you’re wrong. Some of Amidala’s security forces surrendered without resistance, but the rest are at large”—Maul gestured broadly—“hiding in the countryside, waiting for a signal that will recall them to Theed.”
“A signal?” Gunray said. “That’s not possible.”
Maul suppressed an urge to wring the viceroy’s neck. “What’s impossible is your luck in occupying this planet despite your bungling. Do you expect Amidala to simply sit down with you two and work out the terms of her surrender?”
“Isn’t that why she is returning?” Gunray said.
Maul’s hands clenched in fists of rage. “She’s returning to run you out of the Palace and send your ships scampering toward Neimoidia!”
Gunray stiffened in panic. “Sweep the plaza every five minutes!” he instructed one of the officer droids.
“Maintain constant surveillance,” Maul said, “using all spectrums. And increase security at all the detention camps.”
Gunray had just repeated the commands when his comlink chimed.
Maul nodded for him to acknowledge the transmission.
OOM-9’s metallic monotone issued from the comlink’s small speaker. “Viceroy, the Droid Control Ship tracked the course of Queen Amidala’s starship. Only moments ago one of our patrols found it in the swamps.”
Delight shone in Gunray’s eyes. “Have you arrested her?”
“Negative, Viceroy. Like the Gungan city of Otoh Gunga, the starship was abandoned.”
A faint shriek escaped Gunray.
Maul regarded him with loathing. “The Queen and the Jedi have returned. And somewhere in the swamps, I suspect that the Gungans are gathering their Grand Army.” He smiled wickedly. “You may yet have an actual war on your hands, Viceroy. You had better be prepared to fight every bit as hard as the natives will.”
“Find the Queen!” Gunray barked into the comlink. “Make it your top priority to arrest her!”
At the end of his rope, Maul snatched the comlink from Gunray’s trembling grasp and deactivated it. “Enough of your bumbling. I need to inform Lord Sidious of our situation.”
* * *
In the hangar where the Sith Infiltrator was docked, Maul used his wrist link to re-task the probe droids. Less than a day had passed since he had been in Theed, but in that short time the situation had been upended.
Darth Sidious had been informed that the Queen’s starship had been found abandoned in the vast Lianorm Swamp. Gunray had tried to assure Sidious that Amidala and the Jedi would soon be located, but Sidious knew better. The fact that Amidala had unexpectedly set the ship down in the swamps had provided Sidious a clue as to her motives. The Sith Lord had instructed Maul to be mindful, and to let the Jedi make the first move.
Soon after, OOM-9 confirmed Sidious’s suspicions that Amidala and the Gungans were assembling an army.
In a subsequent holotransmission, Sidious had made it plain to Maul that the Jedi, bound by their oaths to the Order, could not take sides. The most they could do was protect the Queen.
With the Neimoidians present during the follow-up communication, Maul had had to read between the lines of what his Master was saying. When Sidious said that the Queen’s foolish actions had surprised him, Maul understood that he was exaggerating. His Master wouldn’t have persuaded or allowed Amidala to return to Naboo unless he had known in advance that she would attempt to enlist the Gungans in her cause to win back the planet. Obviously, Darth Sidious favored the idea of a grand battle. Open rebellion would justify the actions of the Trade Federation in fighting back. More important, Sidious had granted Gunray permission to kill the Queen and as many Gungans as he deemed necessary to secure victory. The pretense of a peace treaty was no longer necessary.
Sidious had dismissed Maul’s concern that the Jedi might be using the Queen for their own purposes, but Maul wasn’t yet convinced that wasn’t the case. If the Jedi weren’t permitted to fight alongside Amidala, why had they returned? If their purpose was to draw Maul out, then someone had to have apprised them that Maul was on Naboo, and the only being who could have done that was Darth Sidious.
Sidious was as eager to encourage a battle between the Trade Federation and the Gungans as he was an ultimate contest between Maul and the Jedi. He wanted to be assured that his apprentice had what it took to be a true Sith.
Maul programmed a series of coordinates into the probe droids and let them fly. Then he climbed aboard the speeder bike to follow them.
There was only one site where Amidala, the Jedi, and the Gungans could be plotting their counteroffensive.
The so-called Sacred Place at the northern end of Paonga Strait, in the swampy basins of the Gallo Mountains.
* * *
Not since whatever elder race had built and once occupied the Sacred Place had it played host to as many sentients and droids. Not merely the Gungans from Otoh Gunga and other bubble cities, and Amidala, her retinue, and the Jedi, but also OOM-9’s squadrons of STAPs, searching in all the wrong places, and the droid commander’s long-range reconnaissance platoons of battle droids, many of which had become mired in the soft ground. For a change, Maul found something to appreciate in the incompetence of the Neimoidians’ army, for it served his purpose.
He sat crouched in a shallow waterway a couple of kilometers south of where the Gungans and the rest had gathered, his presence in the Force deliberately diminished and his wrist link pressed close to his ear, tuned to the frequency used by the probe droids he had sent ahead as listening devices. Filtered by the forest’s leafy canopy, the ambient light was almost aquatic. Around him in all directions rose the ruins of grand stone buildings fronted with hieroglyphic stairways, raised agricultural fields, columned temples, and carved statuary—all of it being slowly disassembled by the roots of massive trees whose seeds had sprouted in the grooves between building blocks and in crevices in the flat stones that paved the plazas.
Since the start of his eavesdropping, Amidala and Boss Rugor Nass had cemented their alliance. Responding to a covert signal, several dozen members of the underground had streamed into the ruins, and the Queen’s chief security officer, Panaka, had returned from a scouting mission in Theed. Maul wasn’t surprised that Panaka had been able to infiltrate the city despite increased security—anyone schooled in military tactics could have done so simply by spending a few moments observing the routines of the battle droids, and then working around them.
Maul hadn’t bothered pointing out the weaknesses to Gunray, because he now wanted the Neimoidians to fail, despite his Master’s plan.
But the Gungan force was not without its weaknesses.
Amidala’s plan called for the use of the Grand Army as a diversion to draw battle droids from Theed to engage the Gungans on the grassy plains. At the same time, she and her elite team would penetrate the Theed Palace and capture Gunray. The Queen was correct in assuming that the droid army would collapse without sentient leadership, but she was mistaken in her belief that Gunray would have to shunt battle droids from Theed. Clearly she had no real awareness of the size of the Neimoidian army. Amidala’s only shot at victory rested with the pilots of the Naboo Space Fighter Corps, who would have to take the fight to the Droid Control Ship in stationary orbit above the planet.
But Maul was left to wonder how Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi figured into Amidala’s plan, since they were supposedly not allowed to intervene in the battle. Certainly they would accompany Amidala into Theed, but would they remain by her side while she attempted to slip into the Palace?
Maul wondered, too, to what degree his Master would want him to intercede. Was he obliged to notify Gunray of Amidala’s plans? Should he attempt to lure the Gungans into a slaughter in Theed? There was still time to sabotage the berthed N-1 starfighters he had found in Theed’s main hangar …
This will work to our advantage, Darth Sidious had said on learning of the Queen’s ploy to ally with the Gungans.
Did Sidious mean to his and Maul’s advantage, or to Sidious and Hego Damask’s advantage? If Sidious and the Muun had designs on Naboo, then the greater the carnage the greater the sympathy for Senator Palpatine in the coming election. Whatever the reasons, Maul’s task remained as before: to kill two Jedi. The rest of it—the blockade, the invasion, the counteroffensive—was nothing more than theater. So what if the Trade Federation lost its army and ten thousand Gungans died? Who cared, after all, about Naboo or its young Queen?
The real war was, as ever, between the Sith and the Jedi.
The deaths of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan would send a message to the Jedi Council that the Sith had returned and the days of the Order were numbered.
* * *
Maul decided that if he never saw Naboo’s grasslands again it would be too soon. But the long ride back to Theed—made all the more circuitous because of Gungans perched in the treetops with macrobinoculars—gave him time to formulate a plan of his own.
He took the speeder bike directly to the hangar, where close to four hundred B1 droids were patrolling the area. That was far too many to be easily defeated by Amidala and her handful of security officers and pilots. With help from the Jedi it was possible that the Naboo could eventually overcome the battle droids, but Maul wanted to ensure that Amidala’s small force would be able to move on to the Palace without encountering too much resistance. More important, he didn’t want Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan worrying too much about her safety.
In the small plaza that fronted the hangar he searched out the droid in charge of security.
“What are your orders, Commander?” the droid said.
“Redeploy your troopers,” Maul told it. “Leave sixty droids to defend the hangar and send the rest to reinforce the platoons safeguarding the Palace.”
The droid took a moment to process the change in orders, though it was the control ship computer that asked: “Will that not leave the space force hangar vulnerable to attack, Commander?”
“I will personally make up for the reduced count.”
That seemed to satisfy the commander, and it lifted its arm in salute. “Copy, copy.”
Instantly, and without a word, droids began to gather in the plaza, where they fell into formation and marched off in the direction of the Palace. Maul watched them go, then hurried into the cavernous building. There he spent a short time imagining Amidala’s arrival, the ensuing firefight, the starfighter pilots racing for their astromech-outfitted ships and launching out over the escarpment, the Queen and Panaka setting out for the Palace …
Maul’s gaze swept the hangar’s broad entrance. A tunnel linked the hangar to the Palace, but Amidala would certainly assume that it had been booby-trapped, and would likely lead the Jedi and her infiltration team across the eastern fork of the Solleu River and through the narrow paths and across the skybridges of the Vis district. But a lightsaber duel fought along that route or in the woods that surrounded the Palace would be difficult to control. Somehow he had to waylay the Jedi before they exited the building. Again he scanned the dim interior, and his gaze fell on the tall blast doors that separated the hanger from the contiguous power generator building. On his earlier visit to the hangar he had done little more than peer into the plasma power station, but now, eager to know what lay beyond the blast doors, he hurried through them.
A short walk took him to the edge of a curved inspection platform flanked by circular engineering consoles. A catwalk extended from the platform across a deep and wide circular extraction shaft studded with towering acceleration columns, within which plasma energy was intensified before refinement and storage. The flashing columns were linked at various levels by service catwalks no wider than the central walkway, which terminated at a narrow door on the far side of the shaft. Maul paced halfway to the door, then returned to the inspection platform and paced it a second time, marking the length and calculating the distances between it and the catwalks above and below. Several times he leapt to higher or lower catwalks. Once he had committed the arrangement to both mental and muscle memory, he walked all the way to the far door and through it.
The door opened on a soaring security hallway, interrupted at regular intervals by laser gates that sealed themselves in response to power outputs of the plasma activation process. Initially the firings seemed to occur randomly, but after he passed through the gates several times in both directions—cautiously at first, then as quickly as he could—Maul began to discern a subtle pattern. The pattern was by no means foolproof, and twice he came close to being fried by the firings, but in the end he had learned enough about the timing of the gates to provide himself with a slight advantage.
Beyond the final gate, the walkway broadened to encircle a narrow-mouthed plasma slough core of indeterminable depth. In an upper-tier maintenance station he found a hydrospanner and dropped it into the core.
If indeed the heavy tool hit bottom, the noise never reached him.
Maul paced the circular rim of the core, gazing down into the blackness; then he turned from the view to imagine and direct how the lightsaber duel would unfold. He would use the laser gates to separate the Jedi. He looked around. Yes: he would kill one of them just there. As for the other…
Well, he’d allow himself a surprise or two.
Confident that his actions would please his Master, he raced to the Palace to await word that Queen Amidala and the Jedi had entered the city.
* * *
A short time later, in the depths of the power generator, Maul had savored the pained surprise in Qui-Gon’s blue-gray eyes as the crimson blade ran him through. Now he paced the rim of the slough core, dragging the blade of his sundered lightsaber along the impervious metal. A dark side anointment, sparks showered down on Obi-Wan Kenobi, who dangled two meters below, with both hands clenched around a nozzle that projected from the core’s inner wall.
Sweat dripped from Maul’s fearsome face, and hatred radiated from his yellow eyes. He snarled at the young Jedi with the long Padawan braid, but Obi-Wan wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of looking at him, or acknowledging his death at the hands of a superior opponent.
In the split second it took Maul to realize that Obi-Wan was actually gazing at Qui-Gon’s lightsaber—where it had come to a rest on the inspection platform—and that Maul had sabotaged himself by drawing out his moment of victory, Obi-Wan leapt straight out of the core and somersaulted in midair, so that he was facing Maul when he landed behind him, with Qui-Gon’s Force-summoned weapon in his hand.
As the green blade went through him, bisecting him at the hips, Maul had a fleeting memory of his life on Orsis, and of performing the same feat Obi-Wan just had, the first time he had used the Force among beings others than his Master.
The power of the dark side had played a cruel trick on him. And that it had, said it all.
Sidious is rid of another problem, for I am not yet a true Sith.
Cut in two and falling, Maul thought: If I had it to do over again, I would keep that fact foremost in mind.
But he was determined to be more lenient with himself than Darth Sidious would be. He would survive his defeat, and grant himself yet another second chance.
Callum's Cantina 