#eogan

So today we're doing star wars maul: lockdown by Joe Schreiber.

Lockdown takes place the year before the phantom menace in 33 BBY and follows maul during an undercover mission on behalf of sidious where he infiltrates the space prison/gladiatorial arena in cog hive sevento under the name Jagganath to get a nuke from the mysterious illegal arms manufacturer Iram radique. This story really is just an excuse to get some brutal fights from the most brutal sith lord that didn't murder his own wife. Add to that a surprisingly fun cast of characters who you mostly want to see die and you've got the perfect prison drama about an almost sentient nightmare worm and it's constantly growing hivemind of souls stuck in an agonising almost dead state that makes the thought bomb on Ruusan look inviting.

I suppose you could argue that the main emotional hook is less the horrific eldritch being consuming the souls of the dammed to try and fill the nihlus gap right in its heart and more the father son dynamic of Artagan and Eogan as they Artie tries to teach his son to be a better man than he could ever be and try to get him away from the violence that defined his entire life up til his son was born. And you'd be right if you weren't so wrong.

Also the ever psychotic ever brutal komari vosa shows up for a bit because we needed at least one lightsaber duel y'know?

Lockdown is a great time. Would recommend to any maul fan or any worm fan. That's all from me. Bye.

@celebrate-the-clone-wars; for Writing Wednesday, Always a Bigger Fish.  From the upcoming next chapter of Blackbirds: Year One.

"Wait, what?"

Maul had spent more time than he ever wanted to talking about things he had no desire to talk about, so Eogan's reaction to the fact he was still a prisoner took him aback; of all the things that had come up, he hadn't expected that to be any particular revelation.  His brow wavered as he took in the somewhat shocked look on the man's face; the topic had drifted from Eogan's days as a prison guard and his process of defecting to how Maul had ended up an officer in the GAR, and even though Maul had no intention of going into details, he saw no issue with revealing his current status.

Which was why he repeated, a bit cautiously, "I'm a prisoner of the Order.  Since my choices were to either sit and rot in a cell or make some use of myself, I asked for parole."

Eogan didn't seem comforted by that.  He sank back into his seat, gaping for a moment, before looking around at the members of the squad also there. "And the rest of you?" he asked, after a moment, fair skin flushed.

Unsurprisingly, it was Tally who answered, with his characteristic bluntness: "He's an extra-legal prisoner and we're property.  If you're asking about what kind of rights we have."

"Slaves," Eogan said, apparently feeling just as blunt.

"Hey, I wouldn't go that far," Husker piped up; he'd been spending most of the time over the past few days listening, aside from the occasional pointed question, but that was apparently enough to prompt him into speaking. "We're purpose-raised, trained soldiers."

Tally's mouth thinned. "Husk, that's no less banthashit than the last time we had this discussion."

Maul didn't expect a fight to break out over it; Husker and Tally remained on opposite sides of that debate, but they had never crossed the line towards meanness.

Husker snorted right back at the medic. "You got your opinions, I got mine.  We don't know what the Republic's gonna do after the war, but I doubt they're gonna kick us into a hole or anything and cover it up.  We're too prominent.  And we've got some people speakin' up for us."

"Not the majority.  A few Jedi.  Senator Organa."  Tally crossed his arms, sinking back into his seat. "You're right, we don't know, but Husk-- you can't think they're just gonna hand us all the backpay we would have earned and hand us Republic citizenship and tell us, 'thanks, guys, have a good -- drastically shortened -- life!'"

"Why not?"

Eogan was watching this, a look of quiet horror on his face.  Just for his own sake, Maul had been shielding fairly strongly the past few days; he'd gotten into the habit of not doing so quite so much when it was just him and the Blackbirds, because it was both useful and comforting to have some sense of how they were feeling, but the high emotional stakes of the conversations of late got Maul back into the habit of blocking all of that out quickly.  Still, he didn't need to 'read' the room to see that look of horror was genuine, as Tally and Husker argued back and forth.

"Who would gain by it?"  Tally swept a hand out. "No one.  No one would gain by having a bunch of clone soldiers, raised from birth, released on a society they'd never technically been a part of."  He paused a moment, then continued, "I'll tell you what I think will happen: Even if we win, which is in no ways a guarantee, we're going to be held as a standing army to prevent this kind of thing ever happening again.  If we're lucky, we'll be deployed on rescue missions or natural disasters.  And then they'll let us age and die off, and then wash their hands of the whole thing."

"Frame it as a good thing," Brody added in, casually. "Play up our ability to help the civvies, maybe come up with a showpiece company or division with the best bases and food to photoshoot, just to make sure the average citizen doesn't feel guilty."

"What good is that kinda thinkin' doin' either of you?" Husker asked back, looking between them as if he couldn't fathom where they were deriving their ideas from. "You can't tell me you think every Jedi leading us thinks we're just disposable and won't speak up for us at the end of the war."

"For every Shaak Ti -- and I'll believe she's actually serious about helping us when someone gives me evidence of the clones she's gotten to freedom instead of onto a battlefield -- there's a Pong Krell," Tally said, sharply.

Both Rabbit and Rancor shuddered in their seats at that name, though they had mostly also been quiet but for questions.  Husker worked his jaw, eyes glittering, then got up from the table and rolled his shoulders. "I'm takin' a break," he said, though he made sure to brush his hand over the tops of Rabbit's and Rancor's heads as he passed them, and give Tally's a gentle nudge.

Tally rolled with it -- the gesture was a common bit of body-language through the squad, a sign of affection -- and then looked after him before resting his face in his hands and breathing out a shaky breath.

Eogan had been watching all of this, looking more and more stricken as it went on, and now when he spoke, there was a broken note in his voice: "These are all war crimes.  The CIS is committing war crimes and so is the Republic."

The subway system had probably never actually seen better days.  Even trying to peer through the gloom and flickering lights and ignore the stench, Rabbit couldn't for the life of him see any evidence that there was any kind of shining glory in its past.  There were only a handful of people down there, none of 'em dressed in costumes, and they didn't seem to care that there were four guys, three of whom glittered in some fashion, darting down the platform and sticking to the shadows.

When a train came shrieking down the line, just as dirty and ill-kempt as the station, the disinterested civilians boarded and no one got off, which left the platform empty when it went on again.  From there, Maul took the lead, leaping down onto the tracks and deftly avoiding the electrical one, before turning back to help them down.

The ground between the track's ties squelched in a way that made Rabbit's stomach turn, but he figured their Lieu had some idea of what he was doing.  He did know Maul had been talking to the rest of the Blackbirds on their way here, because he'd turn and whisper into the collar mic that was paired with the earcuff radio even as they kept moving, but Maul hadn't yet relayed anything back to them, maybe because there just hadn't been time to yet.

Even as bad as the lights were on the platform, though, it was nothing on the blackness of the tunnel.

"I'm glad Tango's not here," Rabbit whispered, and even that echoed, as he clung to Raze with one of his hands and led Eogan with the other.  Listening to the distant shriek of a train that sounded ahead of them made him shudder once.

"Tell me about it," Raze whispered back.

"There's a maintenance access ahead, according to schematics."  Maul didn't whisper, but he still spoke especially softly.  "Brody's also been listening in on the security channels; given what he's hearing, all of this is over a stolen ship, and not directly related to our mission."

Behind Rabbit, Eogan cleared his throat, but didn't offer any explanation.  Even in the dark, feeling the oppressive, dank, stinky blackness pressing all around him, Rabbit had to roll his eyes.

At least until something ran over his foot in the dark, squeaking, before scurrying away.  "--that was a rat.  A rat just ran over my frippin' boot."

"You're in a subway, of course it was," Eogan whispered back to him, dismissively, which kinda made Rabbit want to toss him into the muck. "First time in a place like this?"

"Actually, yeah."  Rabbit scowled some, as Raze stopped ahead of him.  Even just holding hands, Rabbit could feel him shivering and winced a little bit in sympathy, trying to focus on that instead of rats or sewage or whatever other loathsome stuff was hanging around these tunnels.  Then there was a dim light from a panel; Maul took a moment to look over it just as the shriek of a train sounded out again, making Rabbit jump half out of his skin.  "Uh, Lieu--"

"Relax, it's just stopping at the platform ahead of us," Maul answered, as he punched in what looked like a code.  As if he had all the time in the world.  Rabbit swallowed and listened as the train left that station, and then the door opened just as the light started reflecting on the tunnel walls.

Maul shoved them in there one after another, then darted in behind them, turning and palming the door closed again as everything rumbled around them like an earthquake in progress and the train squealed sharply before coming to a stop again at the platform they'd just left.

Once it was gone, all the was left was the sound of their breathing, until Maul ignited his saber, making all of them jump again, pointing the blade at Eogan and glaring in a manner Rabbit had never seen before, the gold glow off of the saber seeming to make the gold of his eyes glow just the same.

"Explain," he growled, and even though Rabbit's vision was still messed up, he watched Eogan almost visibly shrink, with his eyes glittering and his broad shoulders hunched.

Eogan swallowed nervously, still gripping Rabbit's hand in a death-grip, before asking with a thready tone, "Where should I start?"

Maul:lockdown character redesign!!

As Tumblr burns, Blackbirds is very slow going right now.  But here’s the first part of the next chapter, to tide you over.  (Starshines was @shadowmaat‘s concept.)

"Okay, so tell me, who's this-- Prawn Krell?"

Brody almost snorted the fancy caf-drink up his nose, when Eogan laid that one on him.  He set his cup aside and coughed into his sleeve, before descending into helpless laughter, all the while unwittingly attracting the curious glances of everyone around them, all of whom were probably wondering what could possibly be funny about anything on Llanic.

Right now, they were sitting in a quasi-reputable Starshines,  one of the few franchises that was brave enough to try to open places on Llanic, which had been a shadowport for as long as anyone could remember.  The only other one willing to take their chances was Biscuit Baron; Brody had gotten one look at the local one, its sad state and the number of spice addicts chowing down on biscuits outside and decided the cafshop might be the better option for their objective.  Which was, essentially, to look like nobody of import, because nobody of import wanted to look like they were while on Llanic.

After a few more coughs (and stray giggles), Brody shook his head, dropping his voice again. "Not Prawn Krell.  Pong Krell.  He's a jedi general famous for two things: his ability to achieve almost any objective and win almost any battle, and his extraordinarily high body count as he does it."

Eogan was watching his face, eyes pinched some as he took that in.  "You mean, high body count on your side."