Archive of Our Own

Maul stood at the front of the room, hands clasped behind his back. Criminals were not a quiet breed. There was no moment of stunned silence where nobody moved; no, everybody had immediately broken out in shock and mystification when the transmission came in.

Rylee Lawson, in particular, was at his side in a panic. His words filtered in one of Maul’s ears and out of the other. He had long ago grown beyond the naive boy he had once been, with long hair tied at the nape of his neck and a hardened look in his eyes. Although, this concern, this empathy, it reminded Maul of the tribulations on Janix. If he was not focused on analyzing the details of the transmission and reaching across the galaxy for the dull, explosive force of his apprentice, he might have told Rylee as such.

The transmission was sent by a trandoshan whose name Maul could not remember at this moment. He was one of Dryden’s people first and foremost, rather than the members of Crimson Dawn that had been swayed to Maul’s rule right under Dryden’s nose. Devon had played more of a part than she ever knew-- hence the headache inducing uproar.

Maul could not comprehend why Imperials would have been around Oba Diah. The Empire knew well to leave their business alone considering the vast profit it brought in. Devon had merely been delivering orders from Maul, going in his stead because she, quote, 'would kill the mercenaries otherwise'. They’d been grating on her nerves for some time now, he knew. He needed to maintain peace with his followers, so having Devon take a break and remind the Pykes who was in charge was the ideal solution.

It left only a dim conclusion to be made. The Empire was not there for the Pykes. They must have been surveying for incoming ships to stop and search, in which case it was fortunate that Devon hadn’t been delivering cargo. The lowly Imperials sent to orbit Oba Diah should not have recognized her, no matter how much her profile was painted across Imperial channels. They should have been mere lowly Imperials.

Except, Devon had gone quiet, and her ship had been abandoned in ruins. She was captured by the Empire. She should have been well equipped to control the minds of the Imperials and be on her way.

The trandoshan who gave the news was clearly none the wiser. He was not informed enough of Maul’s collective to have been capable of such a betrayal. No, it was clear that the responsibility laid with one of the criminals behind Maul, currently outraged that Devon could be captured in the first place. They had only ever known her as strong and unbreakable, had not seen her collapse to weep during training or scream in the wake of loss.

Maul swiveled sharply, startling Rylee and finally shutting him up. In the time that Rylee had grown up, he had also grown to know Maul, and even without the force he could sense that something had shifted. This was no longer merely the tactical calculations required to find and rescue his apprentice.

The room quieted only slightly as some of the criminals noticed the change. Maul’s hands squeezed together behind his back, fury running beneath his skin. Devon was alive; he could sense it, as dull as the connection was from halfway across the galaxy. There was no doubt that the Empire would have sent an Inquisitor-- it must not have been worse than that, not a Sith, not when Devon still lived-- to intercept her, since they evidently were looking for Devon.

One of the repugnant criminals in this room had informed the Empire of Devon’s trip to Oba Diah. They likely communicated the model of her ship and the timing of her expedition. They undoubtedly received a heaping crate of credits for it that was now harbored right under Maul’s nose.

Beside him, Rylee belatedly put together the pieces, “You don’t think…”

“Oh, I do not,” Maul said quietly, only for Rylee’s ears as his words curdled on his tongue. “I am certain of my theory.”

The room had grown quiet. Anxiety was high in the room, but he could decipher who was concerned for their business and their co-leader, and who was concerned for their own safety.

There were twelve, maybe thirteen criminals amongst them. That was only a meager portion of what Maul’s enterprise had become under Dryden’s nose. There were several others off doing work, and all of his people outside of Crimson Dawn. It was not particularly lackluster growth. Devon’s impact was inexplicable; she believed herself to have fallen for her revenge, but her kindness lasted beneath the surface, and even these criminals devoid of faith or trust had been called to it. It was why they were appalled at her capture, and it was a further burden on the individual who dared to betray her.

The pair of hardened togruta in the corner had long been quiet, whispering between themselves as they tended to. Devon once wrapped a wound that could have gone without it, and they always ensured she wasn't carrying crates on her own in the time since. Concern mingled between them, along with a desire to charge in and rescue her, but a deep disappointment at the impossibility of such an action.

A sullustan stared at Maul, as if daring him to challenge him. Foolish and untrustworthy, but not the anxiety of the belligerent fool who had sold Devon out. He could imagine Devon scoffing at their boldness; perhaps they were one of the reasons she was willing to go to Oba Diah simply to escape the fools that drove her mad.

Maul shifted his focus through each individual, their undivided attention easing his efforts, until he found an aura of dimness. The concern was lacking in the overly tall human, and it was telling. Maul could hardly remember his name.

He focused his gaze on him, leveling him with a flat impassiveness that betrayed nothing but expressed everything to the room around him. The togrutas shifted their anger to the human, hands going on the weapons at their hips. The human’s awkward lies did not process through Maul’s mind as a scowl overtook his face beyond his control for the disgusting nature in front of him.

Everyone in this room had seen Maul kill before. He would have loved to run the offender through with his saber, or choke him until he fell to the ground, but he sensed something else beside him. The boy had been much slower to take to violence than Devon, and a kindness still remained in his features at the worst of moments, but even now, Maul could see the changes in him. His eyes were narrowed with rage.

“Rylee,” he said swiftly.

The human turned to bolt, blaster already equipped as he turned his back, but a blue burst of light landed in his neck before he could get far. Rylee’s blaster smoked in his hand.

He did not like to kill. He’d made this clear time and time again. It made him difficult to work with, his empathy for those who did not deserve it in the slightest inconveniencing Maul at the worst of times, but his trust was most significant. There were only two people that Maul truly trusted, and that was Devon and Rylee, perhaps because of their trust in each other and their partnership with him.

It would be foolish to think that this trust did not go both ways. The three of them were all they had in actuality. Rylee only had Devon and Maul, ever since he had finally joined them. Rylee lacked the ability in the force to sense Devon halfway across the galaxy, wherever she was, captured by Imperials. For all he knew, Devon was dead, and that was enough to override his reluctance to kill.

Rylee set his blaster back in its holster in a motion that reminded Maul of the late Captain Lawson, even years after his death. He pushed past the thought and curled his lip.

He raised his voice, motioning a hand at the body on the floor, “For those who consider betrayal a viable option.”

Immediately, he began his trek out, satisfaction blooming at the way the criminals parted for him. Rylee followed behind him, unease flowing through him as he looked at the body on the floor. They needed to hurry to rescue Devon. She was strong and capable, but the Empire knew this as much as Maul, and she had not been prepared for being seized. Even Maul was incapable when in bindings with blasters on all sides of him.

It was not the blasters that scared him, however. The Inquisitors reigned strong in their quest to kill as many Jedi as they could, and they had largely succeeded in their goals. Devon was a remaining link, no matter how she had severed her connection to the lost Jedi Order. They would be thrilled to kill her.

There was a probable chance that they would not hesitate.

Yet, she lingered in the force, and that was telling enough. Wherever she was, whoever she was being held by, they had not killed her yet. She persevered. There was no doubt that she was being brought somewhere much worse. The possible consequences for Maul, for her, for the operation he’d built, were listless.

Rylee hurried to walk at his side, rather than behind him, his concern bleeding out like an open wound now that they were free of the prying eyes of the members of Crimson Dawn. Maul dared to bat an eye at him, finding soft eyes full of worry.

“She is alive,” Maul said, for tactical reasons, not to soothe his worries, naturally.

Rylee heaved a sigh of relief that could not possibly have been actually necessary.

“I figured your reaction would’ve been a whole lot worse if she wasn’t, but it’s hard to tell. Can you sense anything else?”

“Considering she is across the galaxy… No.”

“Damn,” Rylee whispered, the tenseness returning to his posture as he recalled that Devon was still in danger.

Rylee had learned much about the force simply by virtue of his near-constant proximity to Maul and Devon, but there was only so much he could ever know. He would never be on the same level as them. Luckily, with careful consideration, Maul had designed his role in the syndicate so that the lack of skill was scarcely noticed. He was useful in other ways.

“Are we going to find her?” Rylee asked.

They’d already been walking to the hangar, where Maul’s ship sat unused. Devon had taken a liking to a different ship and liked to take it every chance she could; it was that childlike enjoyment within her, even if it was so often hidden. If she had taken his ship like he often allowed, this might have been more difficult.

Maul imagined Devon in Imperial custody. He imagined her stuck, trapped, outnumbered, staring at an Inquisitor that she hated with a passion. She wasn’t dead, but there was nothing saying that she was okay. Devon did not handle these things well.

She was strong. She’d grown unfathomably strong, as he’d always known she could. They’d eliminated entire battalions of stormtroopers together and were seeding their fingers into the crime world in a way that would help them destroy the entire Empire. It was a fortuitous plan that Devon helped move along, and that in itself was a testament to her strength.

Unfortunately, strength did not negate the way she tended to shut down after eliminating so many Imperials. Or the nightmares that she still had. Nor did it mean that she’d ever been willing to call him her master the way he so readily addressed her as his apprentice, not when her master was rotting on Janix, a memory that she held at the forefront of every life she took. She would not handle this well.

It was a foreign feeling curdling in his heart, frustration pounding that he could not sense even her general direction. She could be anywhere. She was undoubtedly being taken somewhere much worse, somewhere like a Sith Lord’s lair, if they had not killed her yet. The feeling reminded him of Savage and of opening his eyes to a vision of the entire galaxy burning.

“Yes,” he said between grit teeth, the cold outdoor air hitting their skin as they crossed the path toward the ship. “We will find her, and we will kill them.”

His lightsaber was only half with Devon missing. When she accompanied him, they frequently traded her half back and forth, allowing him to use his full saber when necessary. He was at a disadvantage without her.

“If she hasn’t already,” Rylee tried to joke, mirth in his voice, but Maul heard the strain.

Maul nodded firmly, desperately hoping that she was in a position to do such a thing. Devon was as smart as she was strong. He held his concerns at bay, remaining focused as they both hurried into his ship.

“We will go to Oba Diah first. Survey the wreckage, if it remains.”

“I’m sure they already left the system.”

“Of course they did. We must start somewhere.”

“Got it,” Rylee said, his jaw tense. “Two-Boots! Search all Imperial prison logs for Devon. I’m warming up the engines.”

Just as they arrived in the hallway of the ship, the droid made himself known. He held an unnecessary mug that spilled unnecessarily onto the grates below their feet, gleefully jumping into their path as if they had time to dilly dally. Maul could hardly stand the droid, but Rylee had hinged whether he joined Maul and Devon on whether the droid could be allowed to stay. Maul might have deemed Rylee unnecessary in that case, but Devon hadn’t, and the argument had been won.

Maul kept the droid on his ship. He could be used in a pinch, and it kept him away. Devon slept on the ship when she tired of dealing with the mercenaries-- or Maul and Rylee-- enough to keep him company. Now, he narrowed his eyes, ready to demand him to simply listen to the order.

“Devon was captured? I had noticed her return was late-”

“It is unclear,” Maul snapped, hurrying past the droid; Rylee had already walked to the cockpit, doing as he’d said. “We are leaving to find her.”

“Absolutely understood, sir. I presume we have confirmation it was Imperial entanglements?”

“Yeah, Two-Boots,” Rylee said dully.

The droid’s footsteps clanked behind Maul’s much softer steps. Maul took the copilot's seat, having learned to let Rylee pilot years ago after extensive lessons that nearly killed them all, and left the droid the bolted down bin that acted as a third seat. It was convenient to have Rylee flying while Maul and Devon fought their way out of any given situation.

Two-Boots finally quieted as he leaned against the console at the wall, ideally doing as Rylee had asked of him. The prison logs would be encrypted to avoid any navigational information, but they had basic access to most Imperial channels by virtue of the extent of their connections. For this specific purpose, they had Dryden to direct their gratitude toward.

At the reminder of his petulant existence, Maul excused himself to have one of his secret operatives inform Dryden of his departure. Dryden liked to pretend like he was in charge. He spoke curtly with his demand, the ship rumbling beneath his feet as Rylee took charge in a way he was once incapable of. It reminded Maul of Devon’s growth. His hand squeezed into a fist.

He would not have been able to achieve much of his enterprise without her. She’d become as much of a face in Crimson Dawn as he was, even if she despised it perhaps more strongly than Maul. Their partnership had lasted longer than the time Maul ever had Savage by his side, and while Devon could not be considered particularly obedient, the loyalty forged out of connection was undeniable.

Maul could not lose her. She was too much of an asset. The ship was already disjointed without her presence, as unpredictable as it often was. They’d always known their fight against the Empire was coming, but an unexpected attack when she was alone… the criminal’s cards had worked too well. Maul nearly regretted letting Rylee kill the human, seeing as if they could not find Devon before it was too late, he would need someone to raze hell upon. The idea was already tempting.

With a deep breath, Maul clicked his comm shut and lowered his wrist. The ship was accompanied by the familiar rumble of hyperspace. The jump was not long, blessedly.

He returned to the cockpit. He was the one calling the shots, after all. Rylee had whirled his chair around, one leg pulled up in a way that made him appear boyish once again. He straightened at Maul’s arrival, but did not fix his stance in the chair. Two-Boots had lost his mug from where he leaned against the wall beside the console.

Rylee did not wait to fill him in. He never did. It was a luxury scarcely found in the type of criminals and mercenaries they worked with on a day-to-day basis, undoubtedly attributed to his unusual upbringing. His forwardness could be a flaw, but in a setting such as this, it was welcomed.

“She’s not entered into the prison logs,” Rylee said, finally putting his leg down as if in relief.

Maul growled despite the objectively positive information. It was odd. If she was not a prisoner, she could have contacted them or returned. She had not. Her ship was verified to have been attacked and damaged extensively by another ship, and she was still alive, which means she could not have possibly been aboard it.

Either something was afoot or the Imperials were purposefully relinquishing the information. They would only do such a thing if it was a trap. His hands squeezed into fists, leather tightening around his fingers.

“Are you aware that is a good thing?” Two-Boots asked.

“What are you thinking?” Rylee stood, one hand braced on the back of his chair.

They needed to get to Oba Diah immediately. That was the next step toward finding her, and Maul needed that next step. She was waiting-- wherever she was.

“They could be luring us into a trap,” Maul said thoughtfully, opting to stare at the haze of hyperspace rather than the affectionate brown of the Lawsons’ eyes. “Although I have scarcely known the Empire to employ such tactics.”

“In that case, they would be looking for you,” Two-Boots uselessly supplied.

Maul avoided humoring the comment with so much as a glance. He was well aware of the height of which the Empire wanted him dead, and the threat that it posed to everyone around him. If the Empire had tried such a well-thought plot, he felt sure that Devon would have suspected it earlier. She was not infallible-- no one was, not even Sidious-- but her instincts when it came to intricate plans were undeniable. It was as if they called to her beyond the veil of trickery, always more noticeable the more thought they required.

She could have been captured, but they had not entered her into the prison system. It was possible she wasn’t intended to be a prisoner, not when her mere capture would be used to lure Maul in. No amount of lies that Devon could produce would protect her from the Sith. They wouldn’t waste resources entering her into the prison catalogue if she was merely being transported to be used.

Maul’s hands squeezed tighter.

“Devon always knows when a trap is coming,” Rylee said for him, several steps behind in his thought process. “I don’t think it’s that.”

“She cannot predict everything-”

“I agree with the boy,” Maul waved a hand in Two-Boots’ face; he took humor in the way Rylee rolled his eyes at the old nickname. “It is more likely they are not wasting resources when she is a tool to be used by the Sith to find me.”

Two-Boots raised a finger, “You are suggesting that she was sold out, captured, and then ordered to be kept alive rather than murdered, as is standard for Jedi, in order to find you.”

Rylee sat back down quickly and raked a hand through his hair, looking at the viewport instead of them. He was worried. Just as Maul had grown to trust the two young adults, they had grown to foster a friendship built from their shared grief. Maul knew that they were there for each other in the ways that he refused to be-- it was his refusal to show weakness that they did not share. Now, Devon was not here to provide that comfort, and Rylee could not be there for her. It was a problematic situation.

Two-Boots seemed to sense it, more attuned to Rylee’s emotions than just about anything else. He crossed the room and set a metal hand on his shoulder.

These were the feelings that created weakness. Maul inhaled a sharp but silent breath and clenched his hand tighter for the final time.

“They will not survive this offense.”

He turned once again to leave the Lawsons to themselves. These were not feelings that he could help with. Only on the rare occasion did he feel the urge to give them space, let alone know how to handle it. Devon was usually the receptor. Beside himself, she was the only person Maul had seen cry more than a handful of times in his entire life. She was brash enough not to care about his discomfort with her tears, not when they were steadfast and furious.

Her absence seemed to echo throughout the ship. Even if it wasn’t her favorite ship in the courtyard anymore-- he’d taken offence to it at first, until he saw her undeniable joy at whipping the newfound ship through the air-- she was still a frequent occupant. He was often frustrated that he couldn’t find a moment of quiet on it, yet now he grew frustrated that she was not there to incessantly annoy him.

It was likely that even once they reached Oba Diah they would be just as clueless. Devon wasn’t there anymore, and the wreckage of her ship would be cleared. There was nothing to say that she was still in the system at all.

Only in moments like this did the galaxy truly feel so big. It was inconsequential when Maul had held life in his hands and squeezed it out of existence more times than he could ever care to count, but now, with Devon lost, he felt just how far it spanned. The Empire was one entity ruling the galaxy, making it feel whole and singular, but the feeling of utter weakness in a massive minefield was poignant. Devon had been hurt by the Empire enough.

Maul retreated to the back of the ship. He climbed down the ladder to the cargo hold, mostly empty of crates. Maul preferred to keep a clean ship, no matter how much its usual inhabitants complained about transporting every crate in a timely manner.

It was convenient in a moment like this; he walked to the center of the room and glanced around. There was a stray wire twitching with the rumbles of the ship in hyperspace. His metal legs could not feel the slight shake of the ground beneath his feet, but he knew it was there, despite how faraway any sensational memory was anymore.

He crouched until his knees and ankles hit the ground, sitting carefully. Many did not understand that Maul enjoyed the quiet. The rush of hyperspace gave way to the expanse of the force. He’d long ago given up seeking control of all of it, instead seeing it as moldable parts to achieve his goals. Revenge was no easy task against the Sith, and he needed every pawn he could get.

That was what Devon was. After years with her by his side, Rylee dragged along with her, she was both a pawn and an apprentice. Something like Savage had been. He trained her carefully to protect herself and achieve her own revenge in conjunction with him.

A pawn’s lack of safety was nothing to fuss about. Pawns could be replaced. Devon, with half of his lightsaber in her stead, could not be.

Maul shut his eyes and set his hands on his knees. He was not trained to meditate in this way, but he had stolen the method of the Jedi and twisted it into his own process. He doubted that his internal process was anything like what Jedi meditation resembled, but it had its purposes. It attuned him to the quiet. It allowed him to stretch his senses further, to warp the force into something beneath his own hand.

The feeling of his pants beneath his palms sank into the background as he focused on the rush of space and emotions all around him. His own emotions were volatile and sharp, twisting and yanking and telling him to find Devon Izara wherever she’d ended up in this terrible galaxy that they could not control.

He stretched across the futile beings that spanned the galaxy. He did not care for the masses that made up planets or stars, he did not waste time on finding the beauty in such a thing. Maul had a goal, and he was going to achieve it. His reach extended as clearly as if it were his own hand, cutting through all echoes of the force in his journey to find what he wanted.

Somewhere, as weak as if he were holding onto it with just his pinky finger, he felt that bridge of connection. A hand extended-- rage, fury, grief, mourning, resentment, the full wrath of Devon’s strongest emotions, all of them slammed into him as if she was wielding them at this very moment. She echoed from across the galaxy with her most agonized feelings at the forefront of her very soul.

It brought out something unusual in Maul during his forced exploration of the force. Rather than his own anger and frustration, he reached further with something like concern, as gently as asking are you okay? might be, if it were such a thing he was familiar with. He was once again met with Devon’s devastation in its angriest form. He had seen it many times, but it was different to be far away from it, to not encourage her anger and give her a cloth to wipe her tears after the fact.

Maul was not going to find anything else here, not now, not while Devon’s emotions were thrashing around like the most tortured animal conceivable. He knew she was alive. She was alive, and she was fighting, just as he’d taught her.

Why she felt as if she had been torn open and left to bleed her emotions all over the wreckage was unclear. It was concerning. It only heightened Maul’s need to find her.

He had already opted not to dig deeper when he sensed Rylee approaching. He quickly came back to himself, feeling the coarse fabric of his pants and hearing the stuttered rhythm of Rylee sliding down the ladder into the cargo hold. Maul opened his eyes to a room that felt dimmer than he remembered. He knew already that he wasn’t going to tell Rylee of what he’d discovered.

“Oh, sorry, were you meditating?” Rylee paused halfway down the rungs.

“It is done now, continue,” Maul said, halfway annoyed.

Rylee did as he was told, completing his journey with a hop from the second to last rung to the floor. There was a time when he was too tense on any ship to do such a thing. He walked directly to the center of the room and sat with only slight hesitation, seated across from Maul on the cold metal floor.

Maul stared at him, waiting for useless words to leave his mouth. Rylee often lacked a rational reason for the things he did. Such was the lifestyle of a boy raised in luxury and calm, something that not even Devon knew in the way she should have. It had taken quite some time to adjust to, for the both of them.

“I’m worried about her too.”

He blinked. This idea of emotional vulnerability that Rylee embraced was so irritatingly foreign. Every so often, Devon seemed to be on the same page as him, and then she would flip back to Maul’s side of emotional rigidity and anger to be wielded.

“I am not worried,” Maul said the word like it was a different language. “We are capable of locating her.”

Rylee frowned, his head tilting downward as if disappointed.

“Well, kind of, sure. Not really. And we don’t know what we’ll find. She’s in danger, and I’m really worried, and you can be, too.”

A wrinkle formed between Maul’s browbones as he poised himself to argue the point, but he found himself unable to continue on with it. Rylee’s frown was harsh, but Maul sensed the truth behind it. It was not frustration or his own worry, but the want for the connection that Devon usually supplied him.

He was looking for something, blindly reaching in a sea of emotions that he could not sense, and hoping to find ones that mirrored his own. That was a comfort. It was why Rylee and Devon bonded so well; their emotions-- their pain was so similar. Devon was not here, but Maul was, and Rylee was seeking out his own emotions in the next best person.

Maul repressed the urge to take a deep breath and instead inhaled through his nose. Patience. He had to have patience. It would take time to repair the bridge between him and Rylee if he set him off now; that was time that they did not have when Devon was in danger.

“Devon is strong in her abilities,” Maul said, not admitting to concern, but not denying it, either. “I trust her to hold her ground until we arrive.”

He was almost surprised to find how much he meant it. Devon’s strength alone meant nothing against the might of the entire Empire and the Sith, not in this context, but it was enough to keep her safe in the meantime. The knot between his shoulders seemed to relax slightly.

“I’m happy to hear you say that,” Rylee heaved a sigh of relief. “I mean, from my point of view she’s unbeatable, but that’s because I’m on a different level. You’re not. You know the objective truth. She can take care of herself. That’s good. Really good.”

The objective truth. That was how he valued Maul’s word. If they had not been working together for years, Maul would regard him as a fool. Alas, he was the pilot of his ship, and he’d perhaps even saved his life a few times. Just as he regarded Maul’s words with weight, Maul owed him the same respect.

“So it is.”

Rylee nodded hastily, his fingers picking at the line between metal plating in the floors. He was getting dirt in his nails. Maul fought the instinct to smack his hand away.

“Did you ever know that I got captured on Janix? Way back when, before… everything?”

Maul looked away from the dirty abomination on the floor and back at Rylee’s face. He’d grown into his features over the years. His face was slimmer than it once was, not quite underfed, but not fed the three hearty meals a day that a civilian life provided.

“I did. It allowed aspects of my plan to fall into place.”

Rylee chuckled, meeting Maul’s gaze, “Of course it did. I should’ve known. Well, it’s kinda dumb, but I still get nightmares sometimes. That was the scariest thing ever back then. But, I think about it now, if the ‘me’ of right now was in that situation, being treated that way… it would be nothing. Nothing at all. Just another situation to get out of.”

Maul could conceptualize why he was thinking of this now, but he couldn’t summon a response. Of the ordeal that got Rylee’s father killed and nearly took the rest of them with him, his brief and apparently inoffensive capture was a mere blip in an unfortunate memory. Nightmares were only natural.

His silence seemed to be taken as the invitation to continue. If Maul really wanted, he could’ve stopped him. He acquiesced.

“Now I’m thinking of Devon in prison like that. But, it wouldn’t be anything like that, just like if I was captured today, it would be so much worse than it was then. I was just a random kid back then. Now, I work with you, and Crimson Dawn, and I’ve killed tons of Imperials. That’s how they think of Devon, except even worse, as a former Jedi. I can’t imagine. If I have nightmares of what I experienced then... then…”

He trailed off, unwilling to say aloud what he thought Devon was experiencing at this moment. Maul might have left if he did. He could perfectly supply the answers himself.

He allowed himself to take a deep breath, this time. Rylee was looking for emotional intimacy. Maul was not the provider of such a thing, but he could bring light to logic, which Rylee’s emotions were currently clouding.

“You are not wrong,” he said swiftly. “But Devon has experienced much worse than that. She fought in a war before she knew adulthood. She has seen the death of her entire people. She has lost her master and herself. No matter how harsh it may be, she is strong, and she will persevere. We will free her, and if there is a mess, we will deal with it. Such is necessary for the sake of our survival, and for our revenge.”

Rylee nodded heartily. He raised a hand to swipe at his eye, despite its undeniable dryness. Maul did not see him cry often; it occurred to him that if he did cry, he never knew in the first place. His eyes were dry now, though, as if the urge simply didn’t come to him.

“Thanks for saying that,” Rylee murmured. “It just makes me a different type of sad for her, but at least I know you’re right. She can handle herself.”

Maul’s jaw clenched, an ache beginning to form in his head from the mental exertion required of him. Devon was much more skilled at comforting Rylee. Two-Boots had to be a better option.

Maul knew Devon, though. He knew Rylee, too, despite his best efforts. Some part of him felt slightly more settled after voicing the thoughts aloud.

“Indeed.”

As if summoned by his words, a siren rang through the ship, signaling the approaching exit of hyperspace. They were coming up to Oba Diah. Maul needed to face the fact of finding what to do next without a single direction to go in. He would likely have to turn to his contacts, a reliance he did not want to survive off of.

Rylee sprang up, attuned to the siren after years of piloting.

“Time to figure out what the hell happened,” he said, providing a small smile that would not have been found previously.

Maul nodded firmly. They both made their way to the cockpit, where Two-Boots had taken Maul’s seat. He quickly vacated in favor of standing at the console, where he could keep an eye on the scopes once they exited hyperspace.

“Just in time!”

“That’s what the siren is for, Two-Boots,” Rylee huffed a laugh as he fell into his designated seat, resetting the controls with ease.

Maul sat only for the benefit of having the most ideal access to the controls and monitors. He needed to be attuned to everything. This was their first lead, even knowing that it was likely to come up empty.

As foreseen, they exited hyperspace to nothingness. Oba Diah sat in front of them, as dull a speck of existence as always. Devon had merely been delivering a single message. It was angering that such a simple task had been betrayed so vastly to the point of causing such an uproar. Again, Maul regretted that the offender was dead. Perhaps he had to make an example of another useless twat in Crimson Dawn.

They circled the planet in eerie silence, but Maul already knew that there was nothing. He couldn’t sense the ship that Devon had been so enamored with. It left a hollow feeling within him, disappointed as he thought within himself and his resources for what he could do next.

Rylee did not stop circling even after they got past any trajectory Devon would have been on. Maul didn’t tell him to stop, no matter how futile it was. The Imperial ship was gone, and the ruins of Devon’s vessel were already cleaned up. She’d been whisked away.

It was a dead end with no leads.

“Damn it,” Rylee murmured.

Maul’s lips raised in a snarl as he stared at Oba Diah. Devon hated the planet, always complaining of one thing or another. She liked to ignore just how valuable of an asset the Pykes truly were. He had many contacts across the galaxy, in various criminal organizations and in isolation, but the Pykes lay in front of him. They had even more resources than just Maul did.

He was mere seconds away from ordering Rylee to land on Oba Diah so that he could have an honorable discussion with the Pykes when Two-Boots suddenly stomped.

“Hold on! There is a distress beacon in range!”

“What?” Rylee shouted, swiveling the entire chair around as his hands left the controls. “Where?”

Maul leveled his gaze at the droid, hands already curling into fists if this unnecessary distraction delayed his plans.

“Outside of the sector,” Two-Boots typed at the scopes. “Just barely in range. An Imperial ship. It shouldn’t be detectable to us.

“Unless it was modified away from Imperial channels!” Rylee turned back around, grasped the controls, and yanked the ship away from Oba Diah.

“Are you certain?” Maul asked Two-Boots.

“I am simply communicating what I see before me, sir. An Imperial ship has signaled a distress beacon. Typically, Imperial ships only issue these on Imperial channels, but I am seeing this from an open channel. Rylee is right, it could have been reprogrammed.”

“It has to be her,” Rylee said. “Two-Boots, coordinates.”

Near instantaneously they were back in hyperspace for a brief jump, traveling only a sector over. Maul thought of the uproar of emotions that he’d sensed from Devon during his meditation. They would be fitting for if she’d gotten control of an Imperial ship after being captured.

It was likely to be her.

He felt blindsided by having her appear so quickly when he’d been prepared to threaten the Pykes to within an inch of their existence mere moments prior. Yet, as they fell back into realspace, Maul reached out. Again, he felt the storm of emotions; much closer than before. He reached closer and closer, as if setting a hand on her shoulder and saying I’m here. Devon despised Imperials. Even after killing battalions, she would come back to the compound and wreck a room, and then demand to train, in which she’d end up on the ground in tears before they got very far. She did not handle the Empire well. The weight of her rage was more than she could bear without soon after buckling beneath it.

She was still trapped within the Imperial ship, likely dead in space since she had not communicated with them. Possibly trapped, definitely angered, likely having defended herself to the utmost extent.

Maul willed Rylee to push his ship beyond its limits and find Devon. Two-Boots guided him to the coordinates, but the words trailed in the background of Maul’s consciousness as he wondered after his wayward apprentice.

And, suddenly, he sensed her. He did not have to push through the wake of the living force around him. Merely there, loud and angry and grieving, just ahead of him, he sensed Devon. The emotions did not waver in response.

Rylee saw the ship just a moment later.

“There!” He looked at Maul as he propelled them forward, his eyes wide and his emotions open. “Alive?”

“I sense her alive, yes,” Maul said carefully.

“Oh, thank goodness,” Two-Boots exclaimed from behind them.

The ship looked unharmed, but it was in fact inoperative as it floated in the absence of space. Rylee was extremely careful as he approached to dock, bearing the full responsibility of keeping them from bumping as the other ship had no control. The storm of Devon’s emotions had not calmed. She should have sensed them by now, but her judgment was undoubtedly blocked.

She would not be taken to the Sith, though. She was not having her mind pried at. Once this was all over, she would be okay. Maul stood from the cockpit first once he knew Rylee had everything under control, making his way to the door that was currently depressurizing against the Imperial vessel.

He did not sense any other life forms aboard the ship. In their place laid a cold dread that Maul was intimately acquainted with.

Rylee appeared beside him in an instant. Two-Boots was undoubtedly monitoring the cockpit, as was appropriate, but Maul couldn’t care less as they unsealed the door and watched it slide open.

Immediately, he knew something was wrong. He held his saber as he walked into the ship. Devon was near. Rylee was at his heels.

It was the thrum of a saber that he heard first, immediately followed by a quick gasp that he would be a fool not to recognize. Maul and Rylee’s heads both snapped to the left, where they found Devon crouched on a ledge, her saber raised and ready to strike. The red light seemed to soak her entire being.

She clicked his saber off, and Maul saw the blood on her shirt, her sleeve, her forehead. It did not seem to be her own. In an instant, she was off of the ledge.

The relief was so sharp that it surprised him.

“Devon!” Rylee lunged forward in an instant, hugging her despite the blood and weapon in her hand.

She remained frozen momentarily, eyes wide and bloodshot as she stared at Maul. Her arm was positioned awkwardly-- the bone was damaged, undoubtedly. It only took a moment before she wrapped one arm around Rylee’s neck. Her chin landed on his shoulder and her eyes squeezed shut. Maul could see the dried tear tracks on her cheeks.

Devon’s plan must have been to set the distress beacon to non-Imperial channels, wait for a random ship to approach, and then steal that ship and abandon the crew. It was a good plan, just as Maul had known she was capable of.

He looked down the hall, recognizing the stench of spilled blood from all throughout the ship. There was a smear of it across the floor, along with the damage of a lightsaber dragged through metal. Maul deigned to know what moronic tactic the Imperials had attempted that elicited such destruction from Devon.

When he looked back, he found her green eyes on him, bloodshot as they were. She pulled away from Rylee, choosing anger instead of affection, taking a path that Maul had led her on.

Rylee let her go with ease, though a hand remained on her unharmed shoulder. His face was pinched, likely from the smell staining the hallway, perhaps out of concern for his friend. He looked at Maul with a pitiful expression that conveyed worry. Devon stood facing Maul, saber still in hand, her shoulders poised.

Maul was not gentle. He did not provide comfort. He knew no such thing. Yet, there was a sense of damage to the strong way Devon stood, and the dried tears on her face would not be the last. He knew her well after all of these years, and he could not simply move past the worry that had wracked his ship only minutes ago.

Maul nodded at her, the movement as slow as he could make it.

“You did well,” he said quietly, unable to set a hand on her shoulder even if Rylee had not done so already. “You’re injured.”

“I’m fine,” were the first words she said after being found; her voice was jagged.

“Let’s get you some bacta,” Rylee said gently, guiding her backward.

Devon batted a glance at Maul, and then down the Imperial hallway. She never let the Imperials live long enough to figure out what to do with her. It could be spoken as a testament to her strength and training, but it was just as much a rite of her agony. This had not been a careful, tactful fight. It was like a caged animal that broke free and saw only red.

“I will be a moment,” he informed them.

Devon nodded, entirely understanding of why he wanted to see the carnage she’d inflicted. Maul didn’t miss the way Rylee’s forehead wrinkled as he turned to lead Devon home.

Maul walked away from them, treading into the Imperial ship with its stench of blood and death. One part of him was proud of Devon for being capable of such a thing, but he’d already known that; this was needless proof. It was proof that harmed her.

He found the first body at the first bend, followed by two downed stormtroopers with holes through their chests. Maul found more of the like as he continued; severed limbs and rifles lined the hallway. There were blaster bolts spanning across armor that Devon must have deflected. The walls were singed with lightsaber marks. Bodies twisted and bent in incorrect ways in the hallways. Maul stepped around them with ease.

His curiosity took him further. It wasn’t a particularly large ship. As he neared the bridge, he found a hallway of thick metal doors, where prisoners were likely kept. One door was open, two dead stormtroopers inside. A lieutenant laid in the hallway.

That was far from the most curious thing.

At the center of the hallway was an eerily familiar lightsaber, one that Maul and Devon had been careful to avoid for the extent of their years side by side. They would take them on one day, but that required intensive planning and preparation, and the pieces had not slid into place yet.

The Inquisitor’s lightsaber was followed several paces later by the crumpled body of an Inquisitor-- if they could even be referred to as such anymore. If it wasn’t for the lightsaber, it might have taken Maul a moment to put the pieces together, as the lightsaber wounds through the body were unlistable. There was no rhyme or reason to them, no style that Devon had meticulously practiced. It was as if she had taken every emotion and unleashed it on the beast so similar to those that had once cornered her.

That was presumably exactly what she’d done. It explained the whirlwind of emotions through her and the red tinge to her sclera. Maul knew the feeling well, had unleashed such grief himself, and he knew that it was far from a freeing experience. There was revenge, and there was this; the hateful, painful murder of someone who undeniably deserved it but would matter so little.

Maul did not need to see further. He understood well, and he’d seen his apprentice’s capabilities on display much more palpably than this before. He retreated back through the ship, stepping over and beside the bodies lining the floor. It was nothing to bat an eye at, not now.

Once he was through the doorway to his own ship, he sealed the door again, effectively depressurizing the airlock. He made his way to the cockpit, where not even Two-Boots lingered anymore. Devon and Rylee were at the bunks carved into the open wall, those of which were used most often as a medbay. She needed medical attention.

Maul pulled them away from the Imperial ship and set the coordinates for Crimson Dawn’s central homestead. They were on their way back to their rightful space, and Devon was safe with them, injured as she was. It was the optimal outcome.

Despite this, Maul did not feel satisfied. He walked throughout the ship, his footsteps echoing ahead of him as a hallmark to his approach. He expected to hear Devon and Rylee’s voices quiet, but when he got there, he found Devon alone on the bunk and Rylee unpacking a medkit. Two-Boots had gloves on his metal hands.

Devon was leaning against the wall, her eyes open as she stared at the low ceiling above her. Her good arm hung limply in her lap, her feet sprawled across the floor. Her clothes had more blood on him than he’d noticed before.

At his approach, she moved her gaze over to him.

“Her shoulder is dislocated,” Two-Boots said.

Maul nodded, moving toward Devon. She didn’t move. He sat down beside her in the bunk, their shoulders nearly bumping from the forced proximity in the small space. She still did not move.

Her emotions had not quieted; she had merely expelled everything she could.

“I hate them,” she whispered.

There was nothing that needed to be asked. She hadn’t even made it into a cell before she got loose, which was likely how her shoulder was dislocated. She caused so much carnage even with an injury. In that situation, held by the people who had killed her people, confronted by an Inquisitor so similar to the ones who had hunted her to near extinction, she’d simply burst.

“As do I.”

Maul did not offer comfort. He had never done such a thing.

Cautiously, he lifted his own hand and moved it toward Devon’s. Her pinky twitched, but she didn’t move away. When his hand landed on hers, he was surprised to find how cold her skin was, as if the darkness was eating her alive. He heard her swallow.

“I’m fine,” she whispered, her voice even quieter.

“I know,” Maul nodded, meaning the words greatly; she would be fine, indeed.

Physical touch was something foreign to his life. He had been raised to know touch as only pain, and for a long time, her affinity for it had startled him. Her kindness came with pats on shoulders and wrists and a hand offered to help stand. He did not often offer it back, but she continued, as if she knew no other way. She’d given up so much, but she wouldn’t lose that habit, as if it was truly ingrained into her soul.

Maul shifted closer, just enough that her neck would not have to strain. Her face scrunched from the weight of her agonizing emotions, and he knew the feeling that wracked her chest as she shook her head. He understood it all more than she ever knew. He had never rested his head upon another, but that was not something he sought.

Rylee could be the one to do this, but he was busy tending to her wounds, worrying about her in the physical way that he could see. Maul was the only one who could sense the true weight of her grief. He was the only one who had felt the very same thing and stood beyond it to get his revenge.

Devon’s head shifted until it rested upon his shoulder. It was a motion they’d never done before, not in all of the years she’d been at his side, but it felt right. At this proximity, he could feel the slight tremble of her body.

“I killed one,” she said, her voice so light that it was hardly audible.

“And we will burn the rest,” Maul needed no time to think of a reply. “On our own terms.”

He felt Devon’s head move in the slightest motion of a nod. She would be okay. She still had her lust for revenge, it simply needed to wade back past the grief and rage. Maul had been there, too. He too had climbed past it.

Devon would climb past the weight of her own emotions, and she would remember that they would have their revenge. She was going to be okay, just as he’d been hoping, no matter his inability to admit such a thing.