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Ezra couldn’t see a thing in the cell.
The cuffs had long since rubbed the skin on his wrists raw. He didn’t dare move anymore, not wanting to cause himself more pain. His master had to come for him soon. He’d been here for so long. Maul wouldn’t just leave him, would he?
He gently nudged at his bond with his master. He wanted to tell him he was sorry, he wouldn’t do it again, whatever it even was. After the beating his master had given him and his days locked away in this cell, he could barely remember what he’d done to deserve his punishment.
The moment his mind brushed up against his master’s, Ezra found himself viciously shoved away. He whimpered as he sensed his master’s anger and sheer, bitter hatred before he was blocked out completely. He could still feel his master’s presence, but it was muted and distant.
Ezra rested his forehead down on his knees, which were drawn up to his chest, as tears began to well up in his eyes. He’d sensed his master’s anger more times than he could count, but his master had never hated him before. He instinctively moved to wrap his arms around himself, only for the cuffs binding his hands to the wall behind him to stop him short, the metal digging into the bruised and bloody skin of his wrists. He whimpered quietly, trying to blink away the tears. There was nothing he could do to get his master to let him out sooner. He should have known better than to try. His master was probably even angrier with him than he had been before. He always got angry when Ezra tried to avoid punishment.
Ezra didn’t know how much longer he sat there in the darkness, trying to stop his tears in case the door opened and his master saw them. Suddenly, pain unlike anything he’d ever felt in his life burst through his mind, as if someone was driving a spike through his head. Where the bond had been muted and closed off before, he could now feel it more clearly than ever.
And he could feel it being torn apart.
The tearing itself only lasted seconds, but the pain remained, ricocheting around Ezra’s head, growing stronger and stronger with each passing second.
His bond with his master was gone.
Ezra screamed.
He wrenched at the chains that bound him, no longer caring about the pain in his wrists. He howled with rage and grief and sheer terror as he reached out through the Force to find nothing but the empty darkness that surrounded him.
Please! he thought, desperately clawing his way through his own mind, searching for any remaining threads of the bond as he swore to do better, to be better, begging his master not to leave him here to die.
But it was no use.
His master was gone.
Sobbing, Ezra rested his head down on his knees once more. His throat burned as he kept screaming, unable to do anything else to hold back the emptiness that threatened to crush him.
He heard the shift of the door beginning to open and his head snapped up almost involuntarily. A faint glimmer of hope swelled in his chest as he stared at the door.
When it opened, Ezra blinked against the faint light that met his eyes. There was a figure standing in the doorway, and although Ezra couldn’t see it clearly, he knew it wasn’t his master.
“Stars,” the figure muttered. As the figured stepped into the cell and drew closer, its features became clearer. It was a human man, with red-brown hair, wearing a brown robe.
And he carried a lightsaber on his belt.
“You’ll be alright,” the man said, his voice soft as he knelt down in front of Ezra. “I can get you out of here.”
The man reached out and Ezra flinched, shrinking back into the corner he was shackled in. The man waved his hand and the cuffs around Ezra’s wrists opened. Ezra winced as he pulled his hands in front of him, looking down at the bruises and blood that covered his forearms for a moment before looking back up at the man. He could sense the man’s power in the Force, just as strong as that of Ezra’s master.
“You’re safe now,” the man said, holding out his hand, offering it to Ezra as if intending to help him up. “Can you stand?”
Ezra blinked slowly before standing up on his own, bracing one hand against the wall beside him. Fear pounded in his chest like a second heartbeat. What was going on? Where was his master? Who was this stranger and why could Ezra sense him in the Force and why was he carrying a lightsaber?
Something was wrong.
Ezra shoved past the man and bolted from the room, his feet instinctively carrying him through the twisting corridors until he emerged into the cave. He could feel the man following him, could vaguely hear his voice calling out for him to wait, but paid him no attention.
He skidded to a halt, stumbling and nearly falling when he reached the cave and saw what awaited him there.
His master was lying on the ground, a burning wound across his chest. His eyes were closed, his lightsaber lying on the ground just inches from his hand.
He wasn’t moving.
He wasn’t breathing.
Even this close, Ezra still couldn’t sense him.
He was gone.
Ezra felt the stranger’s presence behind him and suddenly it all became clear. The man’s strength he felt in the Force, the lightsaber on his belt, his master’s body on the ground in front of him. The stranger was a Jedi. An enemy.
The Jedi had killed his master.