The Force lightning came without warning.
Savage Opress didn't even have time to raise his hands in defense before the blue-white energy slammed into his chest like a physical blow. His body convulsed, muscles locking, nerves screaming as Dooku's power coursed through him.
The Count stood with one hand extended, expression carved from ice. Around them, the other acolytes watched in silence—Severance Tann, Cadrian Sey, Prosset Dibs, Masana Tide. All of them bore witness as their master made an example of failure.
"You were given explicit instructions," Dooku said, his voice deceptively calm despite the violence of his attack. "Capture King Katuunko. Bring him to me alive. Were these orders unclear?"
Savage tried to speak, but the lightning intensified, stealing his breath. The smell of burning flesh filled the training courtyard. His armor glowed red-hot where the energy concentrated, and beneath it, his skin charred.
"I asked you a question, Savage Opress."
The lightning stopped. Savage collapsed to his knees, gasping, smoke rising from the scorched crater in his chest piece.
"The king... was escaping..." he managed.
"So you killed him." Dooku's tone could have frozen stars. "You allowed your savage instincts to override your orders. You proved yourself to be exactly what I suspected—a beast. Powerful, yes. But uncontrolled. Unreliable. Useless."
Another surge of lightning. Savage's scream echoed across Serenno's grounds.
When Dooku finally lowered his hand, Savage was barely conscious, sprawled on the courtyard stones, his body twitching with residual electricity.
"Get up."
Savage struggled to his feet, every movement agony.
"We're returning you to Dathomir," Dooku said. "Like defective merchandise."
The journey to Dathomir was silent. Savage spent most of it unconscious, his body trying to heal from the punishment. When he finally woke, they were already descending through the planet's crimson mists.
Dooku didn't speak to him. Didn't even look at him. Just used the Force to drag Savage's half-conscious form from the ship like baggage.
The Nightsister village came into view, and Mother Talzin waited at its heart, her expression unreadable.
Dooku stormed toward her, fury radiating from him like heat. Savage was deposited at Talzin's feet with all the ceremony of throwing out garbage.
"Savage. Reckless. Brutal." Each word was clipped, precise, delivered while Dooku paced like a caged predator. "His power is raw, uncontrolled, worthless. He cannot follow simple orders. Cannot think beyond his base instincts. He is an embarrassment."
Mother Talzin listened with the patience of someone who'd weathered far worse storms. Her luminous eyes tracked Dooku's pacing, but she said nothing, letting him vent.
At her feet, Savage tried to kneel properly despite his injuries. Dooku's power pressed down on him through the Force, forcing him lower, grinding him into the dirt.
"Perhaps," Talzin said when Dooku finally paused for breath, "we moved too hastily. In our eagerness to replace Ventress, we did not properly consider what kind of apprentice you required." A deliberate pause. "Asajj would have been more suitable. Her temperament, her discipline—they complemented your methods."
"Where is Ventress?" Dooku demanded.
"She departed some time ago. To the Outer Rim, as she informed you."
"To find her family." Dooku's expression shifted from anger to calculation. "Her siblings with similar power."
"Yes." Talzin's smile was knowing. "The awakening of her abilities revealed connections we had not anticipated. She has relatives—blood kin who share her unique gifts."
Dooku stopped pacing, mind already working through implications. Asajj had finally accessed the power they'd both sought for years. The cost—a temporary severance from the Force—had been high, but worthwhile. When her connection returned, she would be stronger than ever.
And if she had siblings with the same potential...
"If we could recruit them," Dooku murmured, "we would have warriors capable of matching Sidious. Perhaps even Ultron."
"If they can be found," Talzin agreed. "If they can be convinced to join our cause."
"And Gethzerion?" The question came sharper, tinged with concern Dooku rarely showed. "Have you located the exile?"
Talzin's expression darkened. "The other clans attacked her last known stronghold on Dathomir. They found it abandoned. Gethzerion has left our world, but we do not know where she's gone."
Dooku's jaw tightened. Gethzerion—the ancient Nightsister whose power rivaled his own in the dark side, whose knowledge predated the modern Sith, whose very existence represented an unpredictable variable in his carefully laid plans.
Another enemy. Another threat to manage.
"If you want the continued support of my clan," Talzin said, her tone shifting to something harder, more demanding, "and the alliance of the other Dathomir tribes, you must help us destroy Gethzerion. Completely. Permanently."
Dooku studied her, reading the genuine fear beneath the diplomatic phrasing. Mother Talzin—one of the most powerful beings he'd ever encountered—was afraid of Gethzerion.
That told him everything he needed to know.
"Another piece on an already crowded board," Dooku said softly. "I'm fighting wars on multiple fronts—the Republic, Ultron, and now this ancient witch. And somewhere behind it all, Sidious watches and manipulates."
"Gethzerion threatens you as much as she threatens us," Talzin pressed. "You cannot afford to ignore her."
"No," Dooku admitted. "I cannot." He looked down at Savage, still pressed into the dirt by invisible force. "But I also cannot afford incompetence. What of him? I will not tolerate another failure."
"Leave him with us." Talzin's voice took on the quality of an oath. "We kept our promise and provided you with a warrior. Now allow us to complete what we started. We will transform him into something truly formidable. When you face Sidious, Savage Opress will be your weapon."
Dooku considered, then nodded slowly. "Very well. I entrust him to you. But understand—if he fails again, I will not show mercy a second time."
He turned without another word, without even a glance at the Zabrak warrior who'd disappointed him so thoroughly. His cloak billowed as he strode back toward his ship, already dismissing Savage from his thoughts.
Mother Talzin watched him go, then looked down at Savage, who was finally able to lift his head now that Dooku's presence had departed.
"Failure is not the end," she said gently, kneeling beside him. "It is merely a lesson. One you will learn from."
Savage groaned, his voice raw. "He... abandoned me."
"He set you free." Talzin helped him sit up, her touch surprisingly gentle for someone so powerful. "Free to become more than his mindless enforcer. I have a teacher for you, Savage Opress. Someone who will show you how to channel your rage, your power, into something greater."
"Where?" Hope flickered in those yellow eyes. "Where do I find this teacher?"
"He lives in exile at the edge of known space." Talzin's hands began to glow with green luminescence. "Finding him will not be easy. But you will not search alone."
She waved her hand, and green mist coalesced in her palm, solidifying into an amulet—a twisted thing of bone and crystal that pulsed with its own inner light.
"This talisman contains my magic," Talzin said, placing it around Savage's neck. "It will guide you to your master. Wear it always. Trust in its power. And remember—you are not abandoned. You are on a journey to discover your true strength."
"But how will I know—" Savage started.
"You will know." Talzin's certainty was absolute. "When you find him, you will recognize him. And he will recognize you."
Savage touched the amulet, feeling its warmth against his burned chest. "I understand, Mother Talzin."
"Go, then." She helped him to his feet. "Your ship awaits. Your destiny calls. And Savage?" She caught his arm as he turned to leave. "Do not fail this test. There will not be another."
Savage nodded once, then limped toward the landing platform, every step agony but determination driving him forward.
Mother Talzin watched him go until his ship vanished into Dathomir's crimson clouds. Then she returned to her chambers, to the crystal sphere that sat waiting on its pedestal.
She passed her hands over the sphere, and green energy swirled within its depths. An image formed—distant, but growing clearer.
"Soon, my child," Talzin whispered to the image taking shape. "Soon we will be reunited. And old debts will finally be settled."
The image solidified, showing a dark chamber far from Dathomir's orbit.
The Outer Rim - Unknown Location
The room was dark by design, not necessity. Illumination would have been a simple matter—a thought, a gesture, a command. But darkness served a purpose. It focused the mind. Sharpened the senses. Reminded him of what he'd lost, what he'd survived, what he would reclaim.
Darth Maul sat in the center of the chamber, legs crossed, hands resting on his knees. His eyes were closed, his breathing deep and controlled. Before him, his lightsaber hung suspended in the air—disassembled into dozens of components, each piece rotating independently.
This was meditation. Not the peaceful contemplation the Jedi practiced, but the Sith's communion with rage, with pain, with the dark side that had sustained him through years of madness and isolation.
The lightsaber components moved in perfect synchronization, drawn by invisible threads of Force manipulation. They aligned. Connected. Sealed. The weapon reassembled itself, whole once more, and twin crimson blades ignited with that distinctive snap-hiss.
The light painted Maul's face in hellish tones—revealed the intricate horns protruding from his skull, the geometric tattoos that covered every inch of his red skin, the cybernetic legs that had replaced the lower half of his body after Obi-Wan Kenobi cut him in half on Naboo all those years ago.
The lightsaber spun in a lazy circle, both blades humming, then deactivated and settled gently to the floor.
Behind Maul, the door whispered open.
"Jorus." Maul's voice was a rasp, rough from disuse and trauma. "I sense disturbance in your approach. It disrupts my meditation."
The old man who entered bowed deeply, his silver hair and beard marking him as ancient by human standards. His arms were hidden in voluminous sleeves, his expression carefully neutral.
"Forgive my intrusion, Master. But I bring news that cannot wait."
Maul's eyes opened—sickly yellow surrounded by blood-red sclera, the mark of deep corruption by the dark side. He turned his head, fixing Jorus with that inhuman gaze.
"Speak."
"We have arrived at our destination," Jorus said. "All preparations are complete."
Something shifted in Maul's expression—rage that never fully left him, yes, but also anticipation. Dark satisfaction. The twisted smile of a predator finally released from its cage.
"Finally." The word carried years of waiting, of planning, of burning hatred kept carefully banked. "Are we ready?"
"We conducted triple verification throughout our journey," Jorus confirmed. "Every contingency has been addressed. Every variable accounted for. When you give the command, we will move."
"Good." Maul rose to his feet—an action that would have been fluid and graceful if not for the slight mechanical hesitation in his cybernetic legs. "Inform the others. Follow the plan exactly. No deviations. No mistakes."
"Yes, Master." Jorus bowed again and withdrew, leaving Maul alone once more.
The Zabrak warrior moved to the viewport, staring out at the planet hanging in space before him. A world he'd been taken from as an infant. A world that had shaped him without his knowledge. A world his mother had sacrificed everything to keep him from.
"Welcome home, brother," Maul whispered to the distant sphere of Dathomir. "Your master has returned."
In the reflection on the viewport, his smile was a terrible thing—full of pain and madness and a hatred that had sustained him through death itself.
Obi-Wan Kenobi had thought him dead.
Darth Sidious had abandoned him.
But Darth Maul had survived. Had clawed his way back from the abyss through sheer will and rage.
And now, finally, he would reclaim what was his.
His homeworld.
His legacy.
His revenge.
The dark side sang in his veins, a symphony of hatred and power. And somewhere on Dathomir's surface, Mother Talzin smiled, feeling her lost son's approach through the threads of magic that had never truly severed.
The pieces were moving into position.
The board was set.
And the game was about to become far more complicated than anyone anticipated.
Because Darth Maul had returned.
And the galaxy would burn for it.