Unfortunately for John, using the Force doesn't require using his hands. Granted, the visuals do help, but Maul would still be able to call upon his powers even if he had both hands lopped off. While weakening the muscles in his hands makes him drop his lightsaber, it doesn't stop Maul from still pulling the Emperor forward until he's right in front of him.
Maul holds him there for a moment, glaring at him. Not being able to use his hands make combat a bit more difficult but it's not impossible, especially given the natural rage within him. "Clever. Very clever. But not good enough," Maul growls. Then he leans forwards and bites down on the spot between the Emperor's neck and shoulder.
Well, that takes care of the plasma sword, so they've got something to work with.
Maul holds him, and John simply quirks his eyebrows in expectation. This has already gone off the rails in new and interesting ways, and he genuinely does not know what to expect next. It's a bit of a novelty, being restrained. Being glared down by a person who looks like he wants to tear John's throat out with his—
Oh, well, that's rather literal. And would put a huge damper on his afternoon, so he's going to opt out of this one.
Something very bad happens to Maul's teeth. First, it is as simple as his jaw clicking shut again; then the top and bottom rows begin to fuse together. Enamel and dentin run like wax, easy as molding clay, and John thinks this might be most effective if the nerves start twisting too. He does not literally tie them together in agonizing knots, but that's very much the effect he's going for.
It would distract even a trained necromancer long enough for John to step back for some breathing room. Against this guy, John's not so sure.
(Something simmers, just out of sight. There is a faint, thrumming smoke around his heels now. It represents a much larger problem than the guy with the teeth.)
cw: psychic choke, all the fighting cws for this thread really
At first Maul isn't sure what's going on. Then as the pain starts he realizes that this opponent has done something to his mouth. There is a muted sound, a growl of pain or rage or both that cannot escape Maul's mouth for the simple reason he cannot open it. His mouth is fused shut by whatever strange magic this man has at his disposal. It's creepy, weird, and painful, but there's nothing in it which sets off the fear or panic that so often rise when Maul encounters something that reminds him of his past.
No, all he feels right now is just usual rage of wanting to defeat the opponent right in front of him. He leans forward and headbutts the Emperor hard, jutting his head downwards and then back up. No one in the galaxy ever wins when it comes to getting headbutted by a Zabrak. They have horns for a reason.
Well, if this man can mess with his very bones and seal up his mouth as if he is nothing more than a doll to be played, Maul decides to see how well he he was able to do so without oxygen. His hand doesn't come up the way most Force users do to emphasize their actions but still the Emperor will feel his windpipe slowly be closed as surely as if two hands are wrapped around his neck trying to choke the life out of him.
There is a sudden spray of Darkblood, there and then gone: a glitter in the air which collapses to colorless dust and patters mundanely to the ground. John reels back, scrunching his nose around as though to set it back in place. The wounds are gone as soon as they'd formed; there is nothing for him to wipe off his face but that same dust, which he does, with the heel of a hand.
It is more than a mortal has managed on him in the past thousand years. It hurts like a genuine bitch. He'd say as much, but John gets no further than "Ow," before his throat crunches shut.
Okay: this is rude.
Lack of oxygen won't bother him for a while yet, not when he can enrich his own bloodstream with a thought. Getting headbutted in the face again would. So he drags the warped teeth from Maul's mouth, spills them out and builds them up into constructs: it looks like Maul is drooling skeletons. They're not human skeletons, because he has to work with what he's got, and what he's got is a half-understood blueprint of a species he cannot name.
The skeletons have horns. In each eye socket is a speck of livid red light. They crowd in at Maul, bones clicking as they move, and give their new God the cover to step away.
There is still smoke around his ankles, simmering, but he can get away with this. Constructs are a freebie, to a point. And smashable skeletons have always been cinematic in an arena.
The man bleeds, so clearly he's vulnerable. He's about to press his advantage and crush the Emperor's throat completely when Maul feels the painful sensation of his teeth being dragged from his mouth before being spilled upon the ground. With them gone, he feels his mouth unfuse and go back to a state of normalcy. Even the gaps that were just there in his teeth don't seem to be there anymore.
Maul watches in amazement as the teeth on the ground grow into skeletons like something out of an old myth or legend. Well, looks like his opponent now has protectors. Rather than showing any fear or being intimidated, Maul smiles. Now this is going to be fun.
He calls upon his saberstaff and the weapon flies into his grasp. Reigniting it, he leaps forward and starts dealing with the skeletons the way a wolf would be among the sheep. He makes a couple of quick slashes, dealing with the one on his left side first before he turns his attention to the others.
Yeah, yeah, he fixes the guy's mouth. His new friend has been a real sport about getting his dental nerves wiggled around like spaghetti, so it seems only fair.
The smile is wild. This guy really is something else.
"Not bad."
It's good to have his voice back. The Emperor falls back at a leisurely backwards stroll, rubbing his throat as he straightens out any lingering internal damage. He wipes a little more blood-dust out of his eye. He lets his skeletons do their thing.
Maul is too good at this: he powers through skeletons like a knife through butter. Bone chips fall like rain. So their God decides to keep things a little interesting: he stands up every melty-edged victim of the saber, every sheared-off humerus or hunk of ribcage. Each one grows into a fresh skeleton. Five opponents become nine, then thirteen, then twenty.
They surround Maul in a clicking, scrabbling horde: reaching for his eyes, his face, his throat. None of them seem capable or even particularly willing to do much damage, but it's still a horrifying crush of living bone.
And it lets John straighten his clothing, dust himself off, observe the carnage from a more comfortable distance.
"It's over, mate."
He spreads his arms, all amusement, while his servants try to bury Maul beneath their brittle bodies.
It doesn't take Maul long to realize what is going on as the skeletons coming after him multiply. Hmmmm, he'll have to think up a strategy with a little more imagination now than just the usual hack 'n slash that he prefers sometimes. Several of them are dismantled through the Force as Maul sends the bones off all in different directions so it will be harder to put themselves back together.
Good thing Maul wasn't even in that movie or he'd be highly annoyed right about now. He's already working himself up into a fine state and scowls at the Emperor's words. Like so many others here, it seems this powerful opponent has underestimated Maul. It isn't the first and certainly won't be the last.
"You think this is over? I have not yet begun to fight!" There's a crackle of spiritual energy so potent that even a non-Force sensitive like the Emperor will feel it as Maul draws upon every bit of anger, hatred, and determination he has. What he needs to do now requires a lot of power if not finesse. The air swirls around him for a moment and then he just sends a wave of Dark Side energy out in every direction. It's like a bomb going off as the remaining skeletons go flying every which way. If he's not expecting it, that will even knock the other man clean off his feet.
Those in the stands go completely hushed for a moment....and then the crowd goes wild at seeing that display of power from Maul. He's been in fights here in the arena several times but hasn't done anything quite like that and it has definitely drawn attention now that he has. With bared, sharp teeth that make him look like every inch the feral being he is capable of being, he looks to see if there will be anymore shenanigans from his opponent.
This does, in fact, knock John flat on his ass. He lets it. As the dust clears and the bits of bone go pattering across their stadium, he takes a good look at whatever that was. He takes mental notes. He'd love to buy this guy a drink and ask how, and what, and if he could get another couple demonstrations for science.
Still, one thing can be said of God: he is never, never, done with the shenanigans.
The roar of the crowd is a welcome surge of noise, even if they're not roaring for him. It's still his show. He sits up, straightens his shirt, knocks a couple pebbles out of his hair. It has the feel of a pratfall routine. Around them, the shattered skeletons rise and reassemble.
Maul, underneath the haze of rage, is likewise a little curious about the Emperor and what he's able to do. He's never encountered magic quite like this, not even among the rather abundant population of magic users in the city. He takes in the measure of this....is he human? Or only resembling the species superficially the way so many humanoid aliens are like in his own universe.
He flips the saberstaff around in his left hand and makes a few flashy movements with it. They wouldn't be very effective during a real fight but they look awesome when showing off in front of a crowd. "I can do this all day," Maul says in a cocky but not unwarranted fashion.
It looks, in God's holy estimation, pretty badass honestly. He gives a low little whistle, and picks himself back upright with all the grace of a nobody: like he's just a man, like he's somebody's dad. For fleeting moments he seems comically out of place in an arena of death, which is at least funny to him.
"Here's take two, then."
The skeletons screw their heads back on, reattach their arms, put on their feet like wacky shoes. Then, as one lurching and clattering horde, they charge.
They're still just canon fodder. Even given the opportunity, none do anything more than claw and grapple harmlessly for their target: they're all bark. It'll be more of the same if he doesn't spice things up a bit, so he spreads his hands like the maestro of an orchestra.
All the half-dried blood here in the sand, the abandoned waste of past fights, stops being dry. It stops being waste. Warmblood's easiest, resists him the least, so he grabs it as his chosen clay and starts to craft something useful.
From the sand, beads of dark red blood rise as though magnetized; they form a trickle, then a lattice; and suddenly it's not unlike something Maul might have seen in an old dream, faced with a Pthumerian Queen. A net of tacky blood weaves itself into existence and tries to ensnare Maul, tries to take him to his knees. Among the riot of skeletons, everything is maroon and white, lit by the flash and sizzle of the saber.
Oily black smoke simmers at God's heels, but he can keep her down for a little while yet. So long as he doesn't spill any more pain and blood and life, anything to excite her into frenzy; so long as he can start to wrap this up...
Somewhere out of sight, there is a groan of metal as blood and bone shear the lock off a monster's cage.
Oh Sith. Maul really needs to learn when to keep his big mouth shut. But he's got pride and his blood is riled up right now with the thrill of a good fight, so that is most certainly not today. He turns to deal with the skeletons that start to reform, alternately slashing with his saberstaff or tearing them apart with the Force.
He thinks that the tactic is merely to drown him in the many numbers of the skeletons until the net is woven and closing in on him. Maul looks across to the stranger he still knows next to nothing about. Well played, strange man. But Maul's not done yet.
Having torn apart one of the skeletons with his bare hands, Maul holds the skull of one of the horned skeletons like an actor on the stage playing Hamlet. Then he lets go of the skull and it hovers in midair before he aims it right at John's head. It comes zooming at his face as fast as Maul can telekinetically throw it.
He spots the move an instant before the skull comes flying. It's a flair of true Nine Houses style; it's a classic. Maul speeds that sharp orb of bone at him, fast enough to destroy anything in its way—
It freezes in the air an inch in front of God's forehead. The skull hangs suspended. Then it flakes away to so much pale dust, and shows God's smile, behind it.
This is when the Beast bursts into the ring.
It's a big one: approximately moose-shaped, if a moose were dripping bits of gore and strings of black ichor. If a moose probably ate wayward children and the souls of the innocent. Its rack of antlers is a heinous jumble of bone, an ugly crown, and it bugles a sound like metal dragging on metal.
The skeletons turn to this new target. The net of blood drops away, suddenly inert and liquid again. It's an opening; it's a crossroads. Maul is left free to choose his next move.
John, without a speck of surprise, says: "We could play a bit of co-op. If you'd like to join me?"
Maul's beginning to figure out what his next move will be and wondering how his opponent will counter it. As far as he can tell, he's at a bit of a disadvantage against this....is he a reality warper? Or simply able to manipulate the bodies of others? Maul isn't sure. But he can bleed and therefore in Maul's estimation he can die.
Before he can put anything into effect, there's a new player in the arena, and Maul turns to face this new threat. Well, that is one grody looking monster, and Maul knows taking it on will be a challenge by himself. A fun one, to be certain, but the idea of taking it on with this stranger does sound like a good time to Maul. He nods to John. "Alright. Shall we begin then?"
Across the bloody sand, he breaks into another smile.
"I'll set it up, you drop it."
At once, the skeletons burst into movement. They all clatter and clamor towards the Beast, intent on drawing its aggression and hemming it in. When Maul steps forward, it will be with a dozen spindly white shadows at his side.
The net of blood begins to weave itself up again, shimmering at the back of the Beast. He has always loved this part: putting together all the moves for the final takedown. It looks good in movies. It's not something he has gotten to do much of; God is so rarely in his own fights.
Maul finds this guy is much more fun when he's on the Sith Lord's side than fighting against him. He flips his lightsaber around once, twice, and then charges ahead with the little army of skeletons at his side.
The moose monsters bellows and charges Maul, lowering its head in an attempt to gore him. Maul keeps moving forward and at the very last second, he drops down and skids along the arena floor like a baseball player sliding to home. He slices at the creature's tendons with his lightsaber, cutting its tendons to hamstring it.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cw: graphic biting
Maul holds him there for a moment, glaring at him. Not being able to use his hands make combat a bit more difficult but it's not impossible, especially given the natural rage within him. "Clever. Very clever. But not good enough," Maul growls. Then he leans forwards and bites down on the spot between the Emperor's neck and shoulder.
cw: tooth gore
Maul holds him, and John simply quirks his eyebrows in expectation. This has already gone off the rails in new and interesting ways, and he genuinely does not know what to expect next. It's a bit of a novelty, being restrained. Being glared down by a person who looks like he wants to tear John's throat out with his—
Oh, well, that's rather literal. And would put a huge damper on his afternoon, so he's going to opt out of this one.
Something very bad happens to Maul's teeth. First, it is as simple as his jaw clicking shut again; then the top and bottom rows begin to fuse together. Enamel and dentin run like wax, easy as molding clay, and John thinks this might be most effective if the nerves start twisting too. He does not literally tie them together in agonizing knots, but that's very much the effect he's going for.
It would distract even a trained necromancer long enough for John to step back for some breathing room. Against this guy, John's not so sure.
(Something simmers, just out of sight. There is a faint, thrumming smoke around his heels now. It represents a much larger problem than the guy with the teeth.)
cw: psychic choke, all the fighting cws for this thread really
No, all he feels right now is just usual rage of wanting to defeat the opponent right in front of him. He leans forward and headbutts the Emperor hard, jutting his head downwards and then back up. No one in the galaxy ever wins when it comes to getting headbutted by a Zabrak. They have horns for a reason.
Well, if this man can mess with his very bones and seal up his mouth as if he is nothing more than a doll to be played, Maul decides to see how well he he was able to do so without oxygen. His hand doesn't come up the way most Force users do to emphasize their actions but still the Emperor will feel his windpipe slowly be closed as surely as if two hands are wrapped around his neck trying to choke the life out of him.
cw: tooth gore continues
There is a sudden spray of Darkblood, there and then gone: a glitter in the air which collapses to colorless dust and patters mundanely to the ground. John reels back, scrunching his nose around as though to set it back in place. The wounds are gone as soon as they'd formed; there is nothing for him to wipe off his face but that same dust, which he does, with the heel of a hand.
It is more than a mortal has managed on him in the past thousand years. It hurts like a genuine bitch. He'd say as much, but John gets no further than "Ow," before his throat crunches shut.
Okay: this is rude.
Lack of oxygen won't bother him for a while yet, not when he can enrich his own bloodstream with a thought. Getting headbutted in the face again would. So he drags the warped teeth from Maul's mouth, spills them out and builds them up into constructs: it looks like Maul is drooling skeletons. They're not human skeletons, because he has to work with what he's got, and what he's got is a half-understood blueprint of a species he cannot name.
The skeletons have horns. In each eye socket is a speck of livid red light. They crowd in at Maul, bones clicking as they move, and give their new God the cover to step away.
There is still smoke around his ankles, simmering, but he can get away with this. Constructs are a freebie, to a point. And smashable skeletons have always been cinematic in an arena.
no subject
Maul watches in amazement as the teeth on the ground grow into skeletons like something out of an old myth or legend. Well, looks like his opponent now has protectors. Rather than showing any fear or being intimidated, Maul smiles. Now this is going to be fun.
He calls upon his saberstaff and the weapon flies into his grasp. Reigniting it, he leaps forward and starts dealing with the skeletons the way a wolf would be among the sheep. He makes a couple of quick slashes, dealing with the one on his left side first before he turns his attention to the others.
no subject
The smile is wild. This guy really is something else.
"Not bad."
It's good to have his voice back. The Emperor falls back at a leisurely backwards stroll, rubbing his throat as he straightens out any lingering internal damage. He wipes a little more blood-dust out of his eye. He lets his skeletons do their thing.
Maul is too good at this: he powers through skeletons like a knife through butter. Bone chips fall like rain. So their God decides to keep things a little interesting: he stands up every melty-edged victim of the saber, every sheared-off humerus or hunk of ribcage. Each one grows into a fresh skeleton. Five opponents become nine, then thirteen, then twenty.
They surround Maul in a clicking, scrabbling horde: reaching for his eyes, his face, his throat. None of them seem capable or even particularly willing to do much damage, but it's still a horrifying crush of living bone.
And it lets John straighten his clothing, dust himself off, observe the carnage from a more comfortable distance.
"It's over, mate."
He spreads his arms, all amusement, while his servants try to bury Maul beneath their brittle bodies.
"I have the high skeletons."
no subject
Good thing Maul wasn't even in that movie or he'd be highly annoyed right about now. He's already working himself up into a fine state and scowls at the Emperor's words. Like so many others here, it seems this powerful opponent has underestimated Maul. It isn't the first and certainly won't be the last.
"You think this is over? I have not yet begun to fight!" There's a crackle of spiritual energy so potent that even a non-Force sensitive like the Emperor will feel it as Maul draws upon every bit of anger, hatred, and determination he has. What he needs to do now requires a lot of power if not finesse. The air swirls around him for a moment and then he just sends a wave of Dark Side energy out in every direction. It's like a bomb going off as the remaining skeletons go flying every which way. If he's not expecting it, that will even knock the other man clean off his feet.
Those in the stands go completely hushed for a moment....and then the crowd goes wild at seeing that display of power from Maul. He's been in fights here in the arena several times but hasn't done anything quite like that and it has definitely drawn attention now that he has. With bared, sharp teeth that make him look like every inch the feral being he is capable of being, he looks to see if there will be anymore shenanigans from his opponent.
no subject
Still, one thing can be said of God: he is never, never, done with the shenanigans.
The roar of the crowd is a welcome surge of noise, even if they're not roaring for him. It's still his show. He sits up, straightens his shirt, knocks a couple pebbles out of his hair. It has the feel of a pratfall routine. Around them, the shattered skeletons rise and reassemble.
"Best two out of three?"
no subject
He flips the saberstaff around in his left hand and makes a few flashy movements with it. They wouldn't be very effective during a real fight but they look awesome when showing off in front of a crowd. "I can do this all day," Maul says in a cocky but not unwarranted fashion.
no subject
"Here's take two, then."
The skeletons screw their heads back on, reattach their arms, put on their feet like wacky shoes. Then, as one lurching and clattering horde, they charge.
They're still just canon fodder. Even given the opportunity, none do anything more than claw and grapple harmlessly for their target: they're all bark. It'll be more of the same if he doesn't spice things up a bit, so he spreads his hands like the maestro of an orchestra.
All the half-dried blood here in the sand, the abandoned waste of past fights, stops being dry. It stops being waste. Warmblood's easiest, resists him the least, so he grabs it as his chosen clay and starts to craft something useful.
From the sand, beads of dark red blood rise as though magnetized; they form a trickle, then a lattice; and suddenly it's not unlike something Maul might have seen in an old dream, faced with a Pthumerian Queen. A net of tacky blood weaves itself into existence and tries to ensnare Maul, tries to take him to his knees. Among the riot of skeletons, everything is maroon and white, lit by the flash and sizzle of the saber.
Oily black smoke simmers at God's heels, but he can keep her down for a little while yet. So long as he doesn't spill any more pain and blood and life, anything to excite her into frenzy; so long as he can start to wrap this up...
Somewhere out of sight, there is a groan of metal as blood and bone shear the lock off a monster's cage.
no subject
He thinks that the tactic is merely to drown him in the many numbers of the skeletons until the net is woven and closing in on him. Maul looks across to the stranger he still knows next to nothing about. Well played, strange man. But Maul's not done yet.
Having torn apart one of the skeletons with his bare hands, Maul holds the skull of one of the horned skeletons like an actor on the stage playing Hamlet. Then he lets go of the skull and it hovers in midair before he aims it right at John's head. It comes zooming at his face as fast as Maul can telekinetically throw it.
no subject
It freezes in the air an inch in front of God's forehead. The skull hangs suspended. Then it flakes away to so much pale dust, and shows God's smile, behind it.
This is when the Beast bursts into the ring.
It's a big one: approximately moose-shaped, if a moose were dripping bits of gore and strings of black ichor. If a moose probably ate wayward children and the souls of the innocent. Its rack of antlers is a heinous jumble of bone, an ugly crown, and it bugles a sound like metal dragging on metal.
The skeletons turn to this new target. The net of blood drops away, suddenly inert and liquid again. It's an opening; it's a crossroads. Maul is left free to choose his next move.
John, without a speck of surprise, says: "We could play a bit of co-op. If you'd like to join me?"
no subject
Before he can put anything into effect, there's a new player in the arena, and Maul turns to face this new threat. Well, that is one grody looking monster, and Maul knows taking it on will be a challenge by himself. A fun one, to be certain, but the idea of taking it on with this stranger does sound like a good time to Maul. He nods to John. "Alright. Shall we begin then?"
no subject
"I'll set it up, you drop it."
At once, the skeletons burst into movement. They all clatter and clamor towards the Beast, intent on drawing its aggression and hemming it in. When Maul steps forward, it will be with a dozen spindly white shadows at his side.
The net of blood begins to weave itself up again, shimmering at the back of the Beast. He has always loved this part: putting together all the moves for the final takedown. It looks good in movies. It's not something he has gotten to do much of; God is so rarely in his own fights.
no subject
The moose monsters bellows and charges Maul, lowering its head in an attempt to gore him. Maul keeps moving forward and at the very last second, he drops down and skids along the arena floor like a baseball player sliding to home. He slices at the creature's tendons with his lightsaber, cutting its tendons to hamstring it.