“Unless she is already here,” I say.
“Impossible!” They cry this in one voice.
I suggest that together we check out security around the plaza. This meets with their usual glassy-eyed, babbling approval.
We stroll around the central plaza. Waterfalls thunder nearby. Their spray cools the air. The plaza is wide and desolate. I imagine that before the invasion it would have been full of people. I have heard of the fine crafts of Naboo, the musicians, the food sellers, all the pleasures that could be bought or traded for in the center of the great city.
I prefer it empty.
Nute and Rune point out the patrols. They are timed to cover the plaza every fifteen minutes.
“Make it every five,” I say.
Rune points out nervously that there are still pockets of resistance throughout the city. Shouldn’t we keep the troops spread out?
I let my gaze squeeze their puny minds, turn their thoughts liquid with fear.
“Do you think,” I ask in a dangerous tone, “the Queen will dawdle when she arrives, and simply wait for you to pick her up? Think, cretin. Where do you think she’ll be heading?”
Nute barks the order into his comlink. Five-minute patrols! He has begun to fidget.
“There should be surveillance at all times,” I say, sweeping my arm to take in the balconies. “Infrared sensors to alert the patrols.”
Rune tells me quickly that they will arrange it. The Queen cannot escape their surveillance. Everything is under control—
Nute’s comlink signals. He hesitates.
I suggest he answer it, or he’ll find himself thrown over a waterfall.
An officer reports in from the field. The Queen’s ship has been found in the Naboo swamps.
Nute looks stunned. Rune’s ugly mouth drops open. Their stupidity is no longer amusing.
“Have you captured her?” Nute roars.
The officer replies that the ship is empty, and there is no sign of the Queen’s party. They have disappeared.
I say nothing. It is more effective.
Nute’s voice trembles as he orders the officer to send out patrols to search.
I grab his comlink and switch it off. There is no reason to hear more dithering from fools. I hold it in front of his face.
“Everything is under control, you say?” I hiss directly in his face. He flinches. “You’ll pay for this. Now we must contact Lord Sidious.”
Nute nods. He has no choice. But the mere mention of my Master’s name has made him look greener than usual. Things are slipping out of his control. When my Master first contacted the Neimoidians to suggest the blockade, their greed overcame them. They thought this would be easy, no doubt. Now I sense that Nute and Rune wish they were on a planet in the Outer Rim, well away from the Sith Lord’s grasp. Only their fear and greed keep them tethered here.
Lord Sidious appears before us in hologram form. Nute repeats the officer’s report, adding that he has acted quickly to send out search patrols.
“This is an unexpected move for her,” Lord Sidious says. “It is too aggressive… Lord Maul, be mindful.”
He tells me to let them make the first move. Whatever it may be, whenever it may come, I will be ready.
Yes, Qui-Gon Jinn. I will wait for you to make your move. That will leave you open. We will meet each other soon.
For me, patience has never been easy. To calm my mind, I concentrate on the battle I know is ahead. When I reach out to gather the dark side of the Force around me, it is unsettled, turbulent. I know my enemy is near.
My first blow will entice you, Qui-Gon Jinn. My second blow will be the true blow, the one that will stagger you. I know your fighting style now. I know how quickly you can move, and how strong your stroke is. I know that your instincts are good, and that you are fast. None of this will save you. I will push you until you weaken, just as I did before. And when your guard slips for just a fraction of a moment, I’ll strike the death blow.
My hatred is as cold and hard as the stone of the palace floor. It lies inside my chest. I animate it, feed it so that it grows.
A voice pounds in my head, the voice of my Master. It reminds me not to fail.
I remember the gray-blue eyes of the Jedi. There was fierceness there, but distance, too. He saw me, but he also saw through me. He fought me, but he did not hate me.
I will make him hate me.
Nute runs toward me. I am annoyed at the interruption. I turn to him angrily.
“She is assembling an army!” he cries.
At least the Neimoidian patrols do some good. They discover that Queen Amidala has contacted the primitives in the swamp.
I point out to Nute that he told us the primitives had all been rounded up.
“They went into hiding!” he exclaims. “They know the terrain better than we do…”
I silence him with a look. Explanations are excuses. I see that now.
The Gungans are assembling an army. Nute and Rune aren’t worried so much about this. The primitives are no match for the Trade Federation forces. The droid army and its weaponry are invincible.
What Queen Amidala is planning is less clear. Is she planning to fight? Will she ride at the head of the Gungan army? That thought makes me laugh. She will last ten seconds in such a battle. Naboo has no forces to speak of. All of her starfighters have been captured. Her volunteer pilots and officers are in camps. What does she think she can accomplish, depending on primitives with their tiny brains?
And what of the Jedi? Will they ride beside her? Do they really think they can protect her against thousands of battle droids?
I contact my Master. This is news he must hear.
Lord Sidious doesn’t flinch as I report the news. He is somewhat surprised at the Queen’s foolishness.
But now I wonder if she is being manipulated by the Jedi. Perhaps they have some plan in mind. I don’t think the young Queen is wise enough to plot her own strategy. They must be involved.
Lord Sidious rejects my speculation. The Jedi are forbidden to engage in a conflict. They are advisors and protectors, nothing more. And Qui-Gon Jinn would not violate his covenant.
“This will work to our advantage,” he says.
My Master sees farther than I can. The pieces fall into place for him. Of course he is right. The Jedi always abide by their rules. That will be their downfall. They cannot win against the Sith, who have no rules but domination.
“Wipe them out,” Lord Sidious tells us. “All of them.”
We will.
I feel the movement of the dark side as a wave that begins as a ripple and gathers momentum until it towers and crashes against my body, sucking the oxygen from my lungs.
Qui-Gon Jinn is here. He is in Theed.
At last I shall meet my enemy.
Should I kill him first, or kill his apprentice before his eyes? Will I grind his face in sorrow before I finish him?
I will let the battle dictate. I will not plan too much.
I rise smoothly. I activate both ends of my lightsaber, double-checking my equipment, making a few passes to test it. Then I return the lightsaber to my belt.
I close my eyes and focus on the image of my enemy. I have time. Either sensors or the Trade Federation troops will locate the Jedi.
All my life I have waited. All my life I have trained. And here is the moment. My experiences, my knowledge, my instincts—they have all converged on this day, on this world, for my ultimate test.
Even my failure to kill the Jedi on Tatooine only serves as a step toward his defeat. I will use everything I have.
Since I was a boy, I have done everything my Master asked. I have fulfilled task after task, completed mission after mission. Yet I know nothing else matters in the face of this. Today is the day I shall truly prove myself.
I will tear Qui-Gon Jinn apart. My Master will see that I am indeed invincible. He will have no need to punish me, to doubt me, ever again.
Because I do not doubt myself. I know
I will not fail. Sith do not fail. It is not overconfidence I feel, but certainty.
The sensors have reported back. They have been spotted in the spaceport central hangar. Nute and Rune have barricaded themselves in the palace. They are cowards, but even I imagine they can hold the palace against the puny assault of the Queen.
I am ready. Know this: I will seal Qui-Gon Jinn’s fate, and the fate of his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi. I will stand over their dead bodies. I will spill their blood. Their defeat will taste like honey in my mouth. And then I will bring their lightsabers back to my Master and lay them at his feet. He will see what I can do.
And then we shall rule the galaxy together, side by side. We are Sith Lords. No one can defeat us.
VOICE RECORDING
BY: LORD DARTH SIDIOUS
LOCATION: CORUSCANT
I regret to announce that Lord Maul was wrong. A Sith Lord can be defeated if he is an apprentice who falls victim to his belief in his own invincibility.
I take up the task of completing the journal of my deceased apprentice, Lord Darth Maul. Here I shall record what I learned of his death at the hands of the Jedi, Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Lord Maul’s information was correct: the Queen and a small force had invaded the central hangar. Their object was to steal back Naboo starfighters in order to knock out the orbiting Droid Control Ship. This should have been clear to Maul. He should have prevented the ships from taking off. Instead, he focused on the Jedi. These were his orders, but he should have realized a shift in plan was called for.
My apprentice was worthy, but he was never flexible. He focused on the Jedi for personal revenge. I had drilled single-mindedness into my apprentice from an early age. I did not expect it would become a failing.
Several of the ships escaped the hangar. Queen Amidala left for the palace to complete the next step of the plan that I must now ruefully admit was rather bold. It depended too much on luck, but the outcome proves the plan, doesn’t it?
The Jedi remained to fight Lord Maul. No doubt they knew that he was the only one capable of stopping the Queen.
Here was Lord Maul’s mistake: if he could not dispatch them quickly, he should have gone to the palace to deal with the Queen. I do not like the fact that she is still alive…
As for my disappointing apprentice, he met the Jedi in combat. From the report I received he fought well—brilliantly, in fact. It amuses me to think of the Jedi’s surprise at the deadly skill of the Sith. Now they know that we have returned, and they must suspect they are no match for us. Fear must curdle inside them now. Fear is an unfamiliar feeling to a Jedi.
Now they must live with it.
The battle began in the hangar. Darth Maul activated his double-ended lightsaber, a weapon he fashioned himself under my supervision. In his hands this weapon was flawless—or so I thought.
He made the Jedi run. They had to use everything they knew and more to meet his skill. They went at him, two on one, and they could not defeat him. No doubt Maul used his formidable dark powers to blunt their use of the Force.
The battle raged out of the hangar and into the Theed main power generator. It is built with catwalks that run around many levels. Now they were alone, fighting what they all knew would be a death fight.
You wonder how I know what transpired here. It is my job to know everything that affects my plan to take over the galaxy. There are ways to find out anything. Even what lies in the hearts and minds of living beings. My knowledge gives me power. And I do not need to reveal how I come by it.
Qui-Gon Jinn took the lead. A powerful warrior, I suspect he surprised Maul with his stamina. At one point Qui-Gon scored a hit and Maul fell several levels. But by the time the Jedi jumped down to engage him again, my apprentice had gained his feet and fought back with not one bit of energy displaced.
Lord Maul should have told me about his battle with the Togorian pirates. I have read his journal, and I see that he kept a secret from me. If I had known about his leg wound, would I have given different orders, arranged for a backup?
No. I am sure Maul was at his peak when he fought the Jedi. His error was of miscalculation, not weakness. A mental failing, not a physical one. Whether I could have foreseen that is a question I cannot answer.
There aren’t many of those.
At last the battle reached a hallway of deadly laser walls. The force fields separated the Jedi from Maul, and from each other. They had to wait until the walls retracted before engaging in the next stage of the battle.
I do not know if it was luck or skill that set the stage for the final confrontation. Did Maul succeed in separating the Jedi, or did he take advantage of a situation he found himself in? Either way, he performed well.
Now he was one-on-one with Qui-Gon Jinn. A frustrated Obi-Wan was trapped behind the energy walls. It must have been a source of satisfaction for Maul to meet Qui-Gon again. I know he felt shame at his failure on Tatooine. Here was vindication and pleasure for him, a sweet triumph. My apprentice always did receive a peculiar joy from battle.
The duel escalated to a ferocity that taxed the powers of the Jodi. Maul, I am sure, was under control at all times.
Do not neglect old tricks, apprentice. They work.
The battle with Qui-Gon ended with a simple move, a trick: Using the hilt of a lightsaber to knock an opponent under the chin. Maul usually disdained such blunt maneuvers. He is—was—an elegant fighter. Precise. But when he saw his opening, no doubt he remembered my lesson.
A blow to Qui-Gon’s chin left him dazed.
Push your advantage always.
Maul’s lightsaber whirled, and ran Qui-Gon Jinn through. The Jedi Master fell.
I can imagine young Obi-Wan’s scream. If I chuckle, it is only because the arrogance of the Jedi order infuriates me. How I love to deflate them. How much delicious pleasure I get from picturing that moment, when the apprentice saw the Master fall.
This was my victory as much as Lord Maul’s, for it was thanks to my teaching, my training, that he was able to defeat the great Qui-Gon Jinn.
The defeat of such an opponent should have cooled his mind, sharpened his focus. But instead, Maul met his undoing: the young Obi-Wan Kenobi.
I am sure Maul knew the apprentice would attack with great savagery on behalf of his Master. He would have been prepared for that.
But I fear that Maul underestimated Obi-Wan’s control. At first, Maul was winning. The defeat of Obi-Wan was in his grasp. Maul knocked him into the melting pit. Obi-Wan hung by a small nozzle that protruded from the sheer wall. It would have been an easy job to dislodge his grip, knock him thousands of meters down into the pit, and end the life of another nuisance of a Jedi.
Instead, Maul gloated. He contemptuously kicked Obi-Wan’s lightsaber into the pit. He paced in front of the stricken Jedi, snarling. No doubt my apprentice wanted to savor the moment. Against all my teaching, he hesitated in order to revel in his triumph.
The battle is not over until your opponent is dead.
How often had I drilled that into him?
Obi-Wan called on the Force. He leaped from the pit, Qui-Gon’s lightsaber flying to his hand. Maul did not have enough time to parry the blow that must have been the last, great surprise of his life.
My worthy apprentice failed me in the end. He fell into the melting pit. I am glad, at least, that his body was consumed. If there must be an end, it is a fitting one.
Time and again I told him not to underestimate the Jedi. At the end, he did. Now he is dispersed to the far ends of the galaxy.
Meanwhile, the Queen had invaded the palace. She tricked Rune and Nute by using a decoy. Just remembering this makes me feel weary. I could always count on Neimoidian stupidity, but usually it worked to my advantage.
Another battle raged overhead, high in the atmosphere of Naboo. Starfighters tried to hit the main control ship piloted by the Neimoidians. One of the starfighters was piloted by the slave boy Qui-Gon Jinn had spirited off Tatooine for some foolish compassionat
e reason. This boy managed to penetrate the control ship. He blew the reactor. I do not believe this was dumb luck. I will watch this boy. Maul, too, felt the Force in him. The question is whether it is too late for him to control it.
The battle droids collapsed back on Naboo. The destroyer droids deactivated at the palace. The Queen held Nute Gunray. The government was back in her hands.
Defeated by a young boy, a naïve girl, and a Jedi apprentice. It was not a good day.
But it is merely a setback, already in the past. Now the Jedi know that the Sith are still operating. No doubt they will strategize, plan to move against me. No matter. I will defeat them. I feel contempt for all of them: Yoda, Mace Windu, the young Obi-Wan. But I will not make the mistake of my apprentice. I will never forget that they can get lucky.
I do not know what to do with this account. Perhaps I will enter it into the Sith archives. Perhaps I will destroy it. It is a record of miscalculation more than anything. Lord Maul thought he was leaving a record of his cleverness and bravery. Instead, it is a record of his vanity and weakness. Maul made mistakes of impatience and temper. In the end, he had been too hungry for victory. He had failed to expect the resilience of Obi-Wan Kenobi. He allowed his feeling of triumph to distract him.
I, too, made a mistake. Perhaps Maul was not the best choice. For my next apprentice, I will choose more carefully. There must be hate and fear in him. There must be something in his heart that has gone cold, something that I can work on to expand into ruthlessness. But there must be great cunning and intelligence as well.
The next apprentice will make no mistakes.
The time has come for a final face-off between Qui-Gon Jinn and his first, dark apprentice, Xanatos. Qui-Gon’s life—and the life of his thirteen-year-old apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi—are held in the balance.
Discover How It All Began
The Captive Temple
Xanatos was perfectly still, waist-high in deep water, suspended by the Force without kicking or moving his arms. His wet black hair flowed to his shoulders and his sharp blue eyes, as clear and cold as ice crystals, gleamed in the dim light. Watery shadows sent flickering patterns across his black tunic.