rest in peace marcia lucas </3, seen here with her oscar for editing the first star wars. her contributions to the film include putting the iconic trench run together and killing obi-wan kenobi. she was referred to as george lucas’ “secret weapon.” she also worked with martin scorsese. you can learn more about her here, here and in dale pollack’s skywalking
So neat that you got to 1K!!! And so many good prompts, it’s almost hard to pick just one! You are such a good writer and it’s nice to see you getting recognition for it. ^w^
But here’s a request based off the prompts list: Prompt 14, Pre-Phantom Menace Era, Darth Maul x AFAB!Reader.
Well wishes! - 💜🎱✨
A/N: thank you for the kind words!! 🤩 and YEEOUCH! star-crossed with Pre-TPM maul is like... ultimate doom and despair 💔 definitely not a relationship for the faint of heart, that's for damn sure 😭
Prompt 14.) Character and Reader, star-crossed lovers, meet in secret.
content: 18+, afab!reader (can be read as gn! tbh), angst, established relationship, maul is hardcore sith in this but he never says the word, almost break up, impending sense of doom
word count: 2,039
bad moon rising | darth maul x reader
The chrono clicks above your head, each second as unrelenting as the next. Your palms are sweaty from clenching your hands into fists, so you force yourself to open them, pressing them flat against your thighs. Somehow, your apartment doesn't feel like yours, and everything feels foreign. A crash from somewhere out in the city makes you jump. Glaring lights and neon signs from adjacent skyscrapers are interrupted by passing airspeeders, tossing multicolored silhouettes on your quaint walls.
He should have been here by now. He said he'd arrive before midnight, and now it's a quarter past one. You've been up since he notified you on the secure comm. A day and a half ago. You'd barely been able to eat.
The doorbell chimes, and you lurch at the sound. As if possessed, you race to your front door like its the light at the end of the tunnel. There's the deadbolt you unlock with shaking fingers, the chain you slide to open and let dangle like a shimmering metal tail. It takes everything in your power to still your pounding heart. You throw open the door, revealing a cloaked, dark figure.
Eyes like twin flames meet yours.
"Maul!" You gasp, throwing your arms around his shoulders and into the tightest hug you can muster. He breathes your name in an exhale, his arms wrapping just as tight around you, the black fabric of his cloak falling around you like a shade. Immediately, you feel at home. You dig your face into the crook of the Zabrak's muscled neck, the rough material of his hood somewhat scratchy. He smells like cedar and the nighttime air of Coruscant, an artificial, metallic scent that can linger on anyone outside long enough.
"I apologize for being late." He rumbles into your hair, tenderly kissing the crown of your head. When Maul pulls back ever so slightly to rest his strong hands on the curve of your hips, you're able to see his face up close and notice his weary disposition. His work— Whatever it is— must be pulling him thin in all directions. But he offers you a smile, small but meaningful, and it is as warm as the sun.
"It's okay. You're here now." You reply with ease, returning his smile, and kissing him when he leans in. His lips mold to yours, his mouth hot and passionate as he greedily gulps down your soft whimpers, tongue sliding against yours. Maul steps into your apartment, all but walking you with him as he deepens the kiss, and the door shuts autonomously after him. For a wonderful amount of time, Maul and you simply enjoy each other, relishing in the mutual warmth of your bodies, hands gripping wherever they wander. It'd been too long since you'd last seen your lover in person, too long since he's held you firm by the waist. Maul lifts one gloved hand, gliding it up your heaving sternum, your neck, until he cups your jaw.
"Your heart is racing." He purrs after he breaks the kiss, and you'd normally be reduced to a flushed mess after he ravishes you, but his words lack their usual bite. More so, past the relief and adoration you see in his tired eyes, there is a distant, permeating pain. The warm contentment that had bloomed inside you starts to fade as doubt takes its place.
"I was worried." You confess, feeling your heart sink into your gut as the sad look grows more significant. Maul's small smile slips from his face like sand being blown in the wind, his dark tattoos making his deep frown more prominent. His hand still cradles your face, so you lean into his touch and he hums in appreciation. Still, it doesn't seem like its enough.
"You needn't worry for me, my dear." Maul's response is oddly morose, which only adds to the sick sensation in your core. His thumb glides over your kiss swollen lips before he swoops in for another, this time tender but brief. It feels like the kisses he'd give you before leaving for a long stretch of time, distinctly like a Goodbye.
"You're worth worrying for." It's meant to tease, meant to uplift, but unfortunately only seems to upset Maul further. He pulls away from you almost entirely, tethered only by his hand that clasps your wrist. You allow him to guide you to your couch, and you sink into the plush cushion when he bids you to do so. Maul remains standing tall and stiff, a pillar of shadow against the window of your balcony doors.
On any other night, you'd find his presence equal parts imposing and intriguing: Maul is nothing if not a mystery only you were permitted to solve. However, tonight feels different. Things have been different. It was only a matter of time, you think bracing yourself for the bad moon to rise.
"These dalliances—" He begins, and you just know what he's going to say. To spare yourself any more heartache, you muster up what's left of your shaky fortitude to interrupt immediately, even if your eyes sting and your voice trembles.
"If you've come to break up with me: Just leave." Maul almost flinches at the sorrow in your words, his upper lip twitching before he shakes his head.
"No— No!" Maul's indignation is quick, a bolt of hot fury dissipating his somber mood long enough to make him appear more normal. He crosses the living room in few long strides until he's dropped to his knees before you, nestled between your thighs. The Zabrak finally tosses his hood from his head, his crown of horns glinting in the lights from outside. He looks less dour with his crimson face fully exposed, and his eyes wide and glowing faintly in the dark.
"I do not seek to forsake our relationship." Maul says hastily, taking your hands in his again, raising them to his lips to kiss your knuckles. He continues, red and black lips hovering over your hands, "You misunderstand. I... I need to tell you something of utmost importance."
"What?" You croak, trying to blink back the tears that have gathered at the edges of your eyes. Again, Maul's expression becomes closed off, soured. He clenches his eyes shut and curses, then opens them again, his amber eyed stare faraway.
"I have not been entirely honest with you." He says slowly, after a stint of internal deliberation, and at the spark of worry and skip of your heart, he reaches up to cradle your face again. His gaze pierces yours with a decidedness reflected in his tone. Maul's touch is slow and thoughtful, his warm fingertips skimming your cheek like he would fine china.
"Oh, Maul..." You rue, wanting to shake your head of all the possibilities, wishing it to be something easy to swallow, and you look away. Maul turns your face back to him, watching vibrant colors from neon signs paint the mournful look on your face into something beautiful.
"I cannot stay long. I leave for Naboo in mere hours." Maul whispers, his thumb smoothing back and forth across the soft skin of your cheek. You swallow at the intense look that turns his expression, dread sitting heavy in your belly like a stone. The Zabrak's next words are brisk, like he recoils from a poison as he spits, "And it is for wretched business, my love."
"Tell me." You demand, "Tell me, Maul."
Maul is silent, emotions you have no words for playing openly across his face. He opens his mouth, then shuts it again, and the tortured look in his fiery eyes is as alarming as the shudder that possesses his entire body. Part of you wonders what could possibly unsettle him so, but the other part of you has an inkling. More than once he has returned to you battered and bloodied, incensed with the fury of a madman. Those days, deep down, he frightened you. It forced you to acknowledge that long-hilted lightsaber on his hip.
Tonight, the acknowledgement is laid bare.
"I will not lie to you, my love." Maul's voice drops to a low whisper, "It is to kill the Queen."
Oh. All the air is stolen from your lungs in an instant. A coldness wraps around your heart, confirming many of the thoughts you've ignored for so long. The man you've let into your heart morphs from the single dimension you know him in, and suddenly Maul— whose eyes pierce with their sheer resolve— is not as he seemed to be. You wonder about the promises he'd made to you; the home he wished to build with you, the children he sought to have. You wonder how many he's killed and will kill to ensure that future.
"Why?" You ask shakily, though not jumping when Maul suddenly seizes your hands in his. His stare is profound, unrelenting like he looks straight into your soul and then some. Maul is normally very serious, but this is a level near grave. Lights from outside oscillate between blue and red, and in the intermittent darkness, his eyes flash.
"Control." He growls, emphasizing by squeezing your hands, the leather of his gloves squeaking, "The galaxy is lawless, unruly. Too many planets and their systems do as they please, allowing dissent and piracy. Unchecked. Chaotic."
Maul's eyes are somehow both wild and focused, and he seems almost frantic, like you're a fretting bird he's caught in his grasp. He smiles, a humorless laugh passing his lips in an exhale. It looks like a strange excitement. You've never seen him like this.
"Please understand that what we do is for the best. The Republic has lost all credibility, the Senate is weak, and in the shadows my Mast—" Maul cuts off his own words, silencing himself to a jarring degree. Aside from the city noises and your own heartbeat, the silence is deafening. Maul stands, looking down at you with that unrecognizable emotion again.
Who are you, Maul?
A soft ping. Maul fishes his comm device from his cloak, expression steeling as reads the notification of whoever is contacting him. Like he has before when he's gotten this call, he pulls so abruptly from you its as if you've burned him. In long strides, he steps out onto your balcony, but even with his back to you, you can see the harsh blue of a holo projection peek around his shoulders. Whoever he speaks to seems to be synoptic, as the conversation only lasts mere seconds and Maul makes his way back inside. Just as the glass door slides closed behind him, you stand. The two of you stare at each other.
"I do this for you. Everything is for you." Maul murmurs, extending a palm to you. As you had early, your body moves on its own volition, each step drawing you like a magnetic pull to the Zabrak. When you take his hand— warm and chivalrous— you understand. With you, he can afford to be the person he can't in any other context. Maul brings you in close, his forehead touching yours as his lips pause just before yours, hesitant. You answer him with a kiss, eyelashes fluttering shut as his mouth devours you. Parting from him to catch your breath feels like surfacing from an ocean.
Maul unfurls himself from you, setting his shoulders as he straightens up, becoming that unflappable, poised man again. The sickness in your core hasn't gone, but has dwindled to an ache you can ignore. Though, maybe you've been ignorant for too long. Maul dips his head to you, parting slowly, finger by finger. You can't help but feel he is gone in more ways than one.
"I will return." Maul calls from in front of the doorway, throwing his hood over his head once again. You nod, a silent Okay. He returns it with a small, sad smile that is masked with shadow. Neither of you necessarily believe him.
He pivots on his heel, cloak fluttering, and just before the door closes on him, a beam of headlights from an airspeeder crosses the width of the room, unimpeded as it bisects Maul at the waist as a thin, blue line.
“I would eat his heart in the marketplace” is legit the most savage line I have ever heard, I’d like to personally thank Shakespeare for putting into words that feeling of rage and protectiveness women get when some fuckboy hurts another woman
Okay first off, I will always reblog this post, but secondly, I went to Shakespeare in the Park tonight to see this and all the women cheered *so loudly* when Beatrice said this line, and the guy in front of me looked around all shocked and a little scared and said “… oh wow” and it was ICONIQUE
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