When Mace Windu had received the call a month ago he never would have expected this.
Waking up what seemed like a lifetime ago because of a call coming through on a number he had not heard from in so many years...hearing the panicked rattling breaths, and the way the line had gone dead and Mace... Had panicked. Mace still remembered the frantic rush to beg the techs to triangulate the last call, the one that had come from his old Padawan.
Mace's heart had been in his throat, watching and listening as they worked to finally, finally give Mace a location. Talking the Council into letting him go to find his former Padawan had been easy, what had been harder had been finally tracking down Maul himself.
The signal had been relatively straightforward to follow, but what Mace had found within the small Temple he located at the signals source...that had been different.
It had taken weeks before he had established enough trust.
It had taken weeks before finally, carefully, a little boy that Mace would never had expected to find, would never have expected to see...had finally taken his hand.
And now here Mace was, standing by the door, holding the hand of a child.
A small boy, blood-red skin, black tattoos that were fresh and gleaming covering him, his large yellow eyes staring around at everything with a glint of intelligence and cunning that belied his youth.
Mace held the hand of Maul – who was at the most six years old.
Mace stood before the hatch that would let them into the rest of the Jedi Temple, the only place that Mace could think of that would be safe for the small boy that was with him until he could... Mace did not know. Mace did not know whether or not this was a permanent state of existence. He did not know if Maul would wake up one day and be the young man that Mace still remembered with nothing but fondness.
Mace did not know if Maul would have to grow again.
Mace did not know if Maul would be stuck like this and he did not know how to find out.
Mace had spent time not just questioning Maul on what he remembered but trying to get... Mace had initially thought there must be some trap that Maul had triggered, some...curse, and perhaps there was. But the reason for it had gone up in smoke, a shattered Holocron that Mace could not salvage anything from, and had left where it lay.
The last thing that they needed was for the both of them to be in this predicament.
Maul looked up at him and Mace met his gaze, taking in those bright yellow eyes as they looked at him and then back to the door. Maul had yet to let go of his hand.
That was how Mace knew that he was afraid.
Maul did not often seek his physical touch, but Mace had learned that when he did it was often because Maul found something else less appealing than Mace's own presence. It would have been funny if it didn't make something deep within Mace's heart twist.
The fact that Maul was so resistant to touch and yet would constantly seek his out whenever there was something that was too big for him to handle alone...
Mace would breathe it out, but not now.
Right now, he had a small boy that needed him and so quietly, gently, "would you like for me to carry you?"
Maul took in the question, looking from Mace to the door where Mace knew that Maul was able to feel more Force Presences than he had ever felt before in his life – and similarly knew that they were different to anything that Maul had ever experienced. Mace had learned from his Padawan years ago what it felt like, had learned how different it was from his Master's presence, and similarly Mace had felt Maul's own presence in comparison.
