Chapter Text
Max doesn’t remember the last thing he said before the ambush collapsed. Probably a warning. Probably a lie. It all falls away beneath the roar of detonated charges and the static screech in the Force as a hundred lights wink out at once.
The field is dust and wreckage now. Scorched bodies, burned-out speeders, sparks still popping from fractured pylons. The silence afterward is worse than the blast. It hangs too thick. Too heavy. Like the Force has stopped breathing.
He stumbles through what’s left of the skirmish, one boot missing, the hem of his robe singed halfway up the leg. His saber is dying in his hand, blade flickering from fatigue or damage or both. His connection to the Force is frayed, threadbare and unraveling.
He’s the only one left.
He doesn’t sense them in time.
They don’t come in fast, don’t attack from behind. They don’t need to. They step into the open, side by side. Dark silhouettes through the smoke. The red of their sabers ignites together, twin shadows cast across broken stone.
Max freezes.
He knows them. He’d hoped not to meet them like this, but hope has always been a fragile, dying thing.
Rosberg. Hamilton.
Two blades of the same weapon. Sith Lords. Hunters. Not masters and apprentices. Equals. Wielders of the kind of power Jedi are trained to fear but never understand.
He doesn’t wait for them to speak. He lunges.
It’s not strategy. It’s instinct. There’s no clean form in his strike, only desperation. He aims for Nico first, a quick pivot and high arc, but Nico doesn’t even bother parrying. He sidesteps and lets Max’s momentum carry him forward.
Max tries to recover. His second strike is better, tighter, but Lewis is already there, catching the motion before it completes. A sharp twist in the Force knocks Max off balance, and Nico moves in, driving a knee into Max’s side just as he falls.
He hits the ground hard, shoulder-first, and loses his grip on the saber. It skips across the floor and extinguishes.
His mouth fills with dust and blood. He rolls, tries to scramble back onto his feet, but a pull yanks his limbs out from under him and pins him flat. He struggles, but there’s no give. Just two shadows above him, patient and in control.
They don’t say anything for a moment. They watch him.
Then Lewis kneels. Nico doesn’t.
“I expected more from a Jedi,” Lewis says.
“He still has his teeth,” Nico adds. “That’s something.”
Max doesn’t understand what they’re doing until he hears the sound of metal restraints. The snap of one locking around his wrist makes him thrash. He kicks out, catches Nico in the shin, but Nico doesn’t flinch. He leans down and fastens the collar around Max’s throat with the same detached precision he might use on a droid.
The moment it closes, the Force falls away.
It doesn’t disappear. It’s worse than that. It’s still there, surrounding him, but he can’t touch it. It’s like being submerged and watching the surface above without a way back up. The silence inside him is sudden and absolute.
He doesn’t scream. He growls, curses, strains until something in his arms pops.
They let him.
Max doesn’t know what he expects. Execution, maybe. He’d welcome that.
Instead, Nico tugs the leash attached to the collar. Max chokes and drops to his knees.
Lewis watches him closely. Not with cruelty. With curiosity. As if Max is a living experiment.
Then they leave him there, kneeling in the ruins of the field, arms bound, Force silenced, teeth bared.
Neither of them speaks again.
The ship is silent except for the hum of the engine and the electric buzz of his cage.
It’s not a prison cell. It’s a cage. A transparent one with high walls and no edges to hide in. The floor vibrates with motion, the kind that unsettles your bones. There’s nothing in the space but Max, restrained, still in the collar, and the ever-present pulse of Force suppression.
They don’t interrogate him. They don’t even ask questions. They watch.
Sometimes it’s Lewis, seated with his back straight and his eyes unmoving. Sometimes it’s Nico, arms crossed, face unreadable. Often, it’s both of them, flanking the room like they belong to it more than the ship does.
Max tests the walls. He throws his shoulder into them until his muscles burn. The barrier spits static and throws him back each time.
No one stops him.
Eventually, he crumples in the corner, limbs aching, collar still humming faintly against his skin.
He doesn’t cry. But he shakes.
The first time they feed him, it’s not with food.
Lewis is the one who returns, this time without armor or weapon. He kneels outside the barrier and rests his hand against it. The field responds, glowing faintly. Max doesn’t move.
“You’re weakening,” Lewis says. “Not from hunger. From disconnect.”
Max doesn’t answer.
“Do you know what happens to Jedi cut off from the Force for too long?”
He does. But he won’t admit it.
Lewis doesn’t wait for permission. He closes his eyes and channels something through the barrier. Max feels it slide into him like water through cracked stone. Cold, slow, invasive.
He tries to resist. His body seizes with effort. The collar tightens as his energy spikes.
But the hunger wins.
He drinks it in without meaning to. It’s not light or dark. It’s twisted in between, shaped to fit him, familiar in a terrifying way.
When it’s over, Max is left gasping on the floor, shaking with shame and relief.
Lewis just stands. Says nothing else.
Nico comes later, when the lights dim and the hum of the engines softens.
He drops a cloth and a cup into the cage through a hatch.
Max eyes them without moving.
“You look like shit,” Nico says, voice calm. “Wipe your face. You’re not an animal.”
Max glares at him.
Nico doesn’t raise his voice, doesn’t push. He just watches. There’s no kindness in his gaze, but no malice either. He’s assessing, studying.
“You want him to think you’re worth keeping?” Nico adds. “Act like it.”
Then he walks away again.
Max doesn’t touch the cloth.
But he starts watching the two of them through the energy wall, the way they move together in silence, both commanding, neither leading nor following.
They never argue. They don’t divide roles. They take turns handling him like a shared task. Like he’s something they’ve agreed to break together.
He dreams of escape every time he sleeps.
He wakes to the weight of the collar and Lewis’s voice, always close, always steady.
“You’re not ready to serve. But you will be.”
He doesn’t answer.
But every time, he listens a little longer.
Max wakes on cold metal.
Again.
He doesn’t know how long he’s been under. Time doesn’t mean anything in this place, not when the Force is absent, not when he’s sealed inside a cage like a specimen. The lights above him are dim, not bright enough to sting but not soft enough to soothe. They’re the same no matter when he opens his eyes. Always artificial. Always watching.
He reaches out on instinct, trying to feel the rhythm of the ship, of the galaxy, of anything at all but the Force is gone.
No.
Not gone. Just unreachable. That’s worse. He can sense it on the edge of things, a presence just beyond skin, like water through thick glass. The collar around his neck pulses gently whenever he reaches for it, and each attempt leaves him more drained.
He’s learning not to try. That realization settles in his gut like rot.
The ache in his stomach has become background noise. At first he’d thought they were starving him, some slow, deliberate punishment, but they’re not. They feed him. Regularly, precisely. Just not the way he wants.
When it’s Lewis, he’s gentle. Precise.
When it’s Nico, he’s clinical. Icy.
Today, it’s Lewis.
The sound of the barrier lowering makes Max’s spine tense. It isn’t a loud noise, but he’s learned to dread it. The low hum of energy dispersing. The air shift. Footsteps.
He stays lying down, curled slightly on his side, arms folded in toward his chest like an animal guarding its belly. He won’t give them the satisfaction of scrambling to meet them, but he won’t fight, either. Not yet.
Lewis doesn’t speak at first. He kneels in front of Max, near the edge of the cage, not inside it yet. His black tunic is simple, pristine, not a crease out of place. His presence, Force or not, feels heavy. Steady. Not dark, not light. Just… sure.
Max hates that about him. He doesn’t waver.
“I brought something for you,” Lewis says softly.
Max doesn’t answer. His throat is dry, cracked. Even if he wanted to speak, he wouldn’t sound like himself.
Lewis reaches into a small metal case and pulls out a tube. Nutrient slurry. Standard military-grade, engineered for survival, not taste.
Max pushes himself up slowly. Not to reach for it. Just to sit. His body obeys sluggishly.
Lewis doesn’t try to hand it to him. He breaks the seal, squeezes a small amount onto two fingers, and reaches forward.
Max flinches.
He doesn’t want to, but he does. His instincts are too sharp, too starved for control. He jerks back, eyes narrowing in a silent snarl.
Lewis doesn’t retreat. His hand stays outstretched, unmoving.
“You’re not dying,” Lewis says, with calm detachment. “But you are weakening. That’s not useful to us.”
Max bares his teeth. “Then kill me.”
Lewis meets his gaze, expression unreadable.
“That would be wasteful.”
Max’s stomach turns. Not from the food. From the words. He knows when someone is choosing not to lie, and Lewis speaks the truth like it’s a principle. There’s no cruelty in it. No mockery. Just logic.
That makes it worse.
Lewis moves closer, slowly, until he’s inside the cage. He doesn’t sit. Just kneels beside Max and raises his hand again.
“You’ll eat,” he says. “Or we’ll make you.”
Max stares at the fingers, the pale paste coating them, the way Lewis waits with the patience of someone absolutely sure of the outcome. It’s not an if. It’s a when.
Something burns behind Max’s eyes. He swallows it.
His body betrays him first.
His jaw unclenches. Not completely. Just enough.
Lewis presses two fingers to his mouth, carefully. Not forcing. Not yet.
Max lets it happen.
The taste is bland. Slightly metallic. It coats his tongue like glue. He swallows.
Lewis doesn't praise him. He just continues, measured, methodical. A little at a time, hand steady, gaze focused.
Max doesn’t look at him. He stares past, toward the ship wall, and imagines it's someone else’s mouth being fed. Someone else’s choice being eroded.
He makes it halfway through the tube before he jerks his head back.
Enough.
Lewis wipes his fingers with a cloth. He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t reprimand. Just studies Max’s face like a problem slowly solving itself.
“You’re still resisting,” Lewis says eventually, folding the cloth neatly. “But not because you think you’ll win. You’re resisting for its own sake.”
Max says nothing.
“You’ll stop,” Lewis adds, “when the need to fight loses its meaning.”
He rises, smooth and silent, and leaves the cage.
The barrier returns with a soft thrum.
Max closes his eyes.
His lips still taste like steel.
Max doesn’t know what triggers him, not exactly. Maybe it’s the sound of boots too close to his head. Maybe it’s the smell of control in the air. Maybe it’s just the way Nico looks at him like he’s a set of gears that can be oiled into obedience.
But something snaps.
He lunges without thought, a flash of motion that doesn’t need the Force to be dangerous. His body remembers how to fight even if his strength is waning. The chain around his ankle allows just enough slack to reach Nico’s shoulder, to slam into it with his full weight. Teeth bare. Elbow sharp. A shout dies in his throat before it ever reaches his lips.
Nico doesn’t flinch. He moves with chilling speed, sidestepping, catching Max mid-motion, turning the energy against him like it’s choreography. One twist. One press. Max is on the ground, spine against metal, breath punched out of him. The chain rattles.
He doesn’t cry out. He bites it back. He always bites it back.
Nico stands over him, eyes unreadable.
“You’re still under the illusion that this is a battle,” he says. His tone is even. Not cold. Not cruel. Controlled.
Max spits to the side, just missing Nico’s boot.
Nico kneels.
Before Max can tense, fingers are at his throat. Not strangling. Measuring. The collar responds to Nico’s touch, a soft pulse, a hum deep in the nerves. Max’s body goes still. Not by choice.
He can’t move.
“I told Lewis you’d fight harder once the feeding began,” Nico murmurs, voice too close, too calm. “Submission never comes all at once. It peels. One layer. Then another.”
Max’s breath comes fast. His eyes won’t leave Nico’s.
“You’re wrong about me.”
Nico tilts his head slightly, as if amused.
“We’re never wrong for long.”
The pulse through the collar deepens. Max doesn’t scream, but his muscles lock so tight it feels like burning. His vision swims.
Then it stops.
Nico releases him, not gently but not violently either. He steps back. Watches.
Max’s body shakes with the leftover current, every nerve firing in confused directions. His breath rattles. The floor presses into his spine like punishment. The collar stays quiet.
From the corner of his vision, he sees movement. Lewis. Entering the cage like a shadow gliding behind smoke. No sound. No questions. Just presence.
He kneels beside Max’s head, close but not touching.
“Don’t speak,” he says. His voice is quieter than Nico’s. Not soothing. Not soft. Just certain.
Max doesn’t speak. He couldn’t if he wanted to.
Lewis uncaps a small bottle, dips a cloth into clear liquid. Max recognizes the smell. Antiseptic. Not stinging. Gentle. Medical.
The cloth touches his temple where the floor scraped skin. Then his mouth, where he bit himself during the restraint. The touch is slow. Unhurried. Each movement deliberate, like Max is something fragile that might break under pressure.
Max hates that he doesn’t hate the care.
He wants to snarl, to spit, to pull away. But his body is wrung out, and the cloth is warm, and Lewis’s hands don’t shake.
Nico watches from a few feet away, arms folded. He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t intervene. Just waits, like this was always the plan. Like pain followed by comfort is just another lesson.
Lewis tilts Max’s face slightly with two fingers, wiping blood from the edge of his nose.
“This will be easier when you stop treating it like a war.”
Max glares. His voice is hoarse when it comes.
“You’re Sith. I’m Jedi. What else is it?”
Lewis presses the cloth harder for a second, then eases off.
“You’re nothing Jedi right now. You’re caged. Cut off. Alone. The war’s already over.”
Max jerks his head back. The movement is clumsy. It barely matters.
“You think I’ll beg?”
Lewis shakes his head. Not in mockery. Just fact.
“No. You’ll stop needing to.”
He finishes cleaning the wounds and sets the cloth aside. He doesn’t leave yet. His hand rests lightly on Max’s chest, not restraining, just… resting.
“You fought today,” Lewis says. “That’s good. It means there’s still something left in you to shape.”
Max wants to scream. Not from pain. From the knowing. The way Lewis and Nico never yell, never rage, never throw chaos at him. They break him with patience.
That’s the worst part.
Nico moves closer then, crouching to Max’s level.
“You’re not ready to submit,” he says. “But you’re already learning that resistance doesn’t make you free.”
Max says nothing.
The collar is silent now. But the quiet hum of its threat sits just beneath his skin.
Lewis withdraws his hand.
Nico stands.
The barrier rises.
They leave him alone.
Max lies there for a long time, staring at the ceiling, body trembling with exhaustion.
He still tells himself this is strategy. That he’s just waiting. That he's buying time.
But some part of him, buried deep in a corner even the Force can’t reach, begins to wonder.