Hey, uh, for some reason I just now got a one shot idea for @maul-appreciation-week for the prompt "nightmare". (possibly by listening to too much ghost in the shell music)
Summary: Maul has a prophetic nightmare of the events leading to the end of the clone wars.
Content warnings: Nightmares, slight dissociation
It had been months since the loss of Maul's family. Somehow it had been weighing on him more heavily than the loss of his crime network, as if, in the back of his mind, he knew power would be easier for him to replace than a new family. Everything was a reminder of Sidious' continuous over the control over his life. The grief would strike him so bad that he could hardly bring himself to fall asleep, as it was difficult without feeling some kind of resolve. He knew what happens when he falls asleep tormented. Eventually it would, when his body had had enough of his stubbornness.
In spite of how some dreams depict the impossible, ones consciousness will occsionally give into its absurdity in favor of its vividness. This dream saw Maul adrift in space and time. Glimpsing across worlds. Tattoine. A boy he overlooked. Coruscant. A boy afraid. A Dark, familiar presence clothed in light. Naboo. A boy become a man, in love with a fellow pawn. Tattoine. The dream's first wave overwhelming darkness. Coruscant. The clothes of light, removed. Familiar. Replaced. Replaced. Skywalker. Coruscant. The Man is crowned with darkness. Vader. Coruscant. Murder. Mustafar. Violence. Coruscant. Rise to power. The Galaxy. Sidious. Palpatine. Emperor Palpatine.
In a split second, the vision of his master pierced his gaze into Maul's skull, and he was no longer a spectator. Every word was unintelligable, but each spoken had hit him one by one with pain and greif, pulling him in. Lighting shot from Sidious' fingers, and somehow it felt exactly as it did after the death of his brother, imobilizing him, as if the dark side itself was trying to pin him down so he wouldn't escape. There was a glimmer in his mind that it wasn't real. He didn't want it to be. He begun to try to open his eyes.
At least, the vivid, surreal horror reached a boiling point that shocked his eyes open. Then shut, back into the dark depths, then open, desperately trying to will his cosnciousness back to surface pressure, as if the dark master's hands were dragging him under, drowining his mind. Usually he would break out of his dreams in an instant, but now he found himself feeling as if he was trying to fight someone who was trying force a pillow over his face. He called for help. Why wouldn't anyone respond? Why would no one rescue him when he called for help? Which side of his labored blinking was the dream?
Eventually he found consciousness. No more hands clawing at flesh, no more lightning clawing at his veins.....no one in the room with him, as much as he would have liked to be back on the operating table on Zanbar. And although he felt an overwhelming sense of loneliness, a loss of family, he could still feel the unwanted hands, the essence of the dream wrapped around his mind and body like a celophane. Only now, it would not become unwrapped. It was a prophesy.
