Maul's ritual challenge series

The Cup

By Z.P. Florian

Rating: R
Warnings: a little pain.
Disclaimer as usual: The sandbox is not mine it belongs to Lucas. But I really don't bother him too much I'm just taking a handful of sand the kind he doesn't use anyway.
Summary: Sidious has created a clone of Maul.
Feedback to: zpflo@hotmail.com

  The Cup

Palpatine waited for his apprentice. Maul left for his trials, more than a month ago. The Master knew he wasn’t dead, he would have felt that.

As always, the future Sith Lord was sent to Kilmeria, a planet with harsh environment and huge, vicious animals.   With  a lightsaber and the power of the Force, barefoot with nothing more than a thin black robe covering his body,  without any supplies, he was to retrieve a golden cup from the highest mountaintop on the planet. The Master remembered his own trial. He didn’t fight the animals at all; he used the Force to hide himself from the vicious creatures and finished the trial in two weeks. But he was sure that Maul  would fight. Maul was the kind of Sith who took pleasure in fighting. While his Master was  never a warrior, his Sith name reflected that. It didn’t matter how the cup was retrieved. Success was success, however achieved.

He wondered if  the length of time his apprentice needed for the task revealed some hidden fault  in the training.
Maul relied too much on his fighting skills. Yet the Master reminded himself that was only thing that counted...that the Sith must not fail, and Maul had never failed him yet.  He sensed now that Maul was on his way back.

In two days his ship landed.  He walked with a cane, his right leg in a crude splint. The robe he was wearing was stiff with dry blood. He was very thin, just bone and sinew. He was holding himself upright with sheer willpower. That in itself was something that pleased the Master: would Maul be a Jedi, he would have collapsed. Palpatine called a medical droid to put the broken leg in a proper cast and had food brought in.

Maul  was eating slowly, knowing that in his starved state he had better start with small amounts first. “Master,what is the cup for.”

“I will let you know when you are in a little better state. There’s one more thing I need to teach you.”

“Master, I’m fine. It is just pain and some infected wounds. I can ignore that. Teach me now.”

“No, you must be in a better shape. It is not easy. Take off that robe, let the droid tend to those infected wounds. It is not a very good idea to suppress the pain, with the Force, you must allow yourself to feel it. Otherwise you might die from a wound that you don’t acknowledge.”

Maul undressed, and Palpatine shook his head, seeing how badly wounded he was.  His body was covered with clawmarks and bites. The droid washed him with a harsh disinfectant. It hurt horribly, but Maul never made a sound.
“Rest now, and I’ll see you tomorrow night in the laboratory.” Palpatine took the cup with him when he left. 

Maul slept, his sleep disturbed by dreams of his trial. He dreamt of dying before he could reach the cup. He came close to that all too often. The huge animals were immune to the Force manipulation that always gave him an advantage over most beings in the universe. And because of their size, even a well-placed slash of the lightsaber merely gave them a surface wound. There were creatures whose paws were larger than Maul; once one of them actually carried him in its teeth. Fortunately, he managed to activate his saber, scratching the huge tongue, and he was then spit out. He fall against a rock, cracking a rib, and that was just a day after he arrived. The rib healed soon enough. But while it was healing,  he  had to slow down.

Food was another problem, he didn’t know what kind of plants were edible. His Master told him that it was part of his trials to find out. Sometimes when he ate something that looked edible, he was sick afterward. Other kinds of plants didn’t hurt him, but they didn’t nourish him at all. Finally he found a kind of moss that tasted horrible, but it was digestible and kept him going. His progress was slow as he was weak. On the last leg of his journey going up the mountain, there were rocks that were impossible to climb, and he had to levitate up. Sustaining the levitation took tremendous effort. Most of the time he managed, but once he felt his strength ebbing and fell back--that’s when he broke his leg. After that, every step was a nightmare.

Once he even considered lying down and never getting up again. But he forced himself to go on, willing himself to imagine the cup in his hand, the feel of the cold metal. I will make it true, he thought, and went on. In his dream he couldn’t get up.  He woke up with a strangled cry, dizzy with relief that he was not there anymore.

He slept better after that. In the morning he washed himself. In the mirror of the sani, he saw his tattooed body looking thin, but he knew that his muscles were still there, and he’d be all right soon. He ate a modest breakfast, still not daring to eat too much.

He had nothing to do all day, so he allowed himself some rest, just lying on the bed, dozing on and off. At night he sensed that his Master was ready for him, and he went into the laboratory. He had been there before when he learned about poisons and explosives, drugs and medicines.

Now he was surprised to see that the laboratory was much larger than he remembered. The back wall was opened. Behind it there was a large room bathed in a green light.  Palpatine was there with the cup in his hand.

“Have you ever wondered ,Lord Maul, how could the Sith survive with only two for centuries?”  This was the first time that he was addressed as a Lord, he was very pleased with that.

“Yes, Master, I always thought that this proved that we are superior to the Jedi,” Maul said.

“Indeed, “ Palpatine smiled. “We have knowledge beyond what the Jedi can even dream of, and now it is time for you to learn this. Follow me.”

He walked into the room, pushing several buttons on the wall. He was carrying the cup. Maul thought the cup looked full with a thick black liquid.  The floor parted, and Maul found himself looking down into an even larger room, similarly lit with green light.

A ladder led down there. On at the right wall Maul saw nine containers with clones of his Master; on the left there were nine containers of his own clones.  “See, my young apprentice, this is as near to immortality as anyone can get. Those are not clones as common people understand cloning. Those are containers ready to accept our minds in case this body you are in now dies or is irreversibly crippled, or gets too old  to function properly. What you need to learn is to leave your body at will and enter one of the containers.”

“But I’m not dead, Master.”

“Would you be dead,  it’d be too late to start teaching you this. We will practice the transfer until it will be as natural as pulling on your boots. This will require you to disable your body temporarily. It is a rather unpleasant experience, but not harmful.” Palpatine pushed a green button. A droid came and took one of the clones out of the vat.

“The clone doesn’t need to be right beside you, but it has to be on the same planet. Your clones will be packed into
your ship. I always take one with me when I travel.”

Maul remembered that his Master always traveled with a large, elegant chest. Everybody assumed that it contained his clothes and it did--but only on the top. Maul though that the bottom must be a stasis box.

“Come here now. Stand still.” Palpatine reached into the pocket of his robe, and a small silver globe looking like an earring appeared in his hand. He inserted it into Maul’s ear.

“This is a monitor and a transmitter. It monitors your body, and if it senses that you are nearly dead, it sends a signal to the mechanism that releases one of the clones from stasis. It will emit a little sound that signals you that the clone is ready for the transfer. It takes only seconds.” Palpatine smiled. “The Jedi don’t have knowledge like this. Centuries of studies led the Sith to knowledge far beyond what those lightsiders ever discovered.”

He offered the cup to Maul. “Take a sip, not more.”

Maul  obeyed. He felt fire spreading in his veins, his body was burning up, he was gasping for breath this was pain beyond anything he had ever experienced. He heard himself cry out.

“Control yourself, do you hear the sound?”

He did a small soft ringing in his ear.

“Now, concentrate, gather your essence, and leave this body that causes you so much pain.”

Maul tried, he sensed his Master guiding him.  He managed and was soon looking at his own body through the clone’s eyes. A droid, was hovering over the body, administering a shot.

“Now come back. We will do it again.”

He dreaded the pain of the poison. He understood now why some people would beg for mercy. A Sith doesn’t beg. The shot apparently neutralized the previous dose in his body He reached out for the cup and swallowed. Screaming, he fell on the floor, hearing the little sound from his earring. This time it was easier to leave his body. Practice makes perfect.

“You are almost there,” Palpatine said. “Three more times and I’ll be satisfied. You can be killed nine times, and still be here to serve the Sith--unless you fail me. If I kill you, you won’t be able to transfer.”

“How old are you ?” Maul asked from the body of the clone.

“Not much older than four hundred years.”

Maul went through the process three more times. The transfer got easier, but bearing the pain of the poison didn’t. When they were through, he asked why was so much pain necessary.  Palpatine explained to him that the soul wouldn’t leave the body easily if there wasn’t more pain than a human being could bear.

A week later they were leaving for Kilmeria. This time there was no need to climb the mountain; they landed therewith their ship. 

“You can now put the cup back on the altar.”

“Can’t someone just steal it?” Maul asked.

“Nobody can touch it but a true Sith. It is bound to the altar with the Dark Side of the Force, and it has the power to kill anybody else.”

Kilmeria’s dark sky glittered with stars above them.

“Look up, Lord Maul, all those words will belong to us soon. And the Jedi will be no more. This is the time for the Sith to rule the Galaxy. Our work is almost complete.” The Master’s triumphant feelings caused a strong tremor in the Force. The wind rose to howl around them.

Maul dropped his shields to enjoy  the moment completely.

He went down on his knees. “Thank you, Master, for making me a part of this tradition.”

END