Maul vs. His Sinuses

Maul vs. His Sinuses
Salana Mniall
salana@hotmail.com

Disclaimer: Big George owns those characters that are owned by Big George. Siubhan owns the Sith Academy, which is owned by Siubhan. Shaggy, a friend of mine IRL, owns himself, but I borrowed him for the burping competition--Sonja, I promise I'll return him.

With a groan, Darth Maul fell off the couch. He hadn't felt this horrible since the hangover after he'd beaten Final Sith Fantasy. As he sleepily landed on his face, the combination of sudden throbbing pain around his eyes and small cat claws digging into his shoulderblades prompted him to scream.

Perkily, Obi-Wan Kenobi peered through the latest set of holes in the wall. Maul vaguely remembered banging his head against the wall when he'd mentally tallied up the number of times he'd slept with SidiSpawn. Even the thought of it made him retch.

"Morning, neighbor!" greeted the Padawan. Ugh. SidiSpawn. If only they weren't so damn sexy. "You look a little down," continued Obi-Wan. "Would you like some of my Alderaanian waffles? Qui-Gon brought over some blue whipping cream last night."

With a great effort, Maul ratcheted both of his eyes open, glaring at Obi-Wan. "No. Absolutely not. Never will I eat purple and orange spotted breakfast food with blue toppings."

"Suit yourself," Obi-Wan replied perkily. "But if you need anything, you know where to find me." Turning around so that his butt was visible through the holes, he waggled his little cheeks enticingly and sauntered away.

Maul moaned. He was dying here, and that little prick was only worried about getting some. Speaking of pricks, he thought to himself as Sidious wandered through the door. Ugh. Maul, admittedly, had only a partial glimpse of his Master, but that was enough to tell him that Sidious's sashay was akin to Kenobi's, only...creepier.

"What? Am I seeing correctly? My young apprentice, on the floor, without any of my children accompanying him?" Maul growled angrily, to avoid losing last night's dinner. Sidious cackled and continued prating. "And not ogling Darth Lara Croft. My apprentice, I wonder if you could be feeling well?"

Maul managed a groan.

"Aaaah, that is it." Sidious cackled again. "Poor little thing. I suggest you call the doctor."

"What...my Master?" Maul grated. "Isn't that...awfully nice for a Sith Lord?"

"Not at all, my young apprentice." More cackling, crescendoing as Sidious contemplated the torture his apprentice was about to suffer. "Calling the doctor is a fine activity for honing hatred. In fact, I think I shall go home and make an appointment with my urologist."

Maul winced, then howled as the movement multiplied the pain in his face exponentially. "Certainly, ...my Master."

***

"Thank you for calling Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO. This call costs seven credits a minute. If this is a life-threatening emergency, please call 91129115711298792 or your local religious official. If you would like to make an appointment quickly, please press the smiley face key." Aah! This sounded promising, but Maul discovered he had no smiley face button on his phone. The recorded voice repeated the message in 40 languages, one of which seemed to consist entirely of Backdoor Bantha Boyz "songs" played backwards, then continued in Basic.

"If you know the extension you are calling, please dial it now. Otherwise, please remain on the line." The 40 languages repeated this message. "If you are a human, please press 1 now. If you are a Hutt, please press 2 now. If you are a Rodian, please press 3 now. If you are a Wookiee, please press 4 now. If you are a Chadra-Fan please press 5 now. If you are a Twi'lek, please press 6 now. If you are a Quarren, please press 7 now. If you are a Selonian, please press 8 now. To hear this message again, please press 9 now. To continue on to the next set of species listings, please press 0 now." Maul savagely hammered the 0, and the recorded voice went on pleasantly, "If you are a Neimoidian..."

Twenty minutes later, Maul was gritting his teeth. The recording simply went on pleasantly. "...If you are a Gungan, please press 5 now. If you are a Hooloovoo, please press 6 now. If you are a Jedi of a species not listed, please press 7 now. If you are a Sith of a species not listed, please press 8 now. To hear this--" Finally! Paydirt! Maul mashed the 8 button, and Sidious's recorded voice came on. "This is Senator Palpatine, with a friendly message for all those would-be Sith out there. Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO, regrets that it is unable to provide medical assistance to those who only identify themselves as 'Sith'. Please go back and try again to find your species' appropriate listing."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" Maul screamed. Growling softly to himself, he hung up and dialed again. 9-1-1-2-9-1-1-5-7-1-1-2-9-8-7-9-2.

"Hello, and welcome to Coruscant's Emergency Response Team."

"I need--" Maul began, but the voice kept blathering without him. Another recording!

"Your call is important to us, and we will try to answer it in the order in which it was received. Please hold." Kessel Spice Girls blasted out of the holoaud receiver, causing Maul to moan and sink his face in his hands. That only intensified the pain, so he groaned some more. Finally, the torture stopped and a surly voice came on.

"What do you want?"

"I need to be seen by a doctor," Maul began.

"Is this a life-threatening emergency?"

Two hours of fury came to a boiling point within the Dark Lord of the Sith. "Yes! This is! I am threatening your life! If you do not arrange for me to be seen by a doctor right away, I shall stomp over to your pitiful little station and flay your skin off with a blunted butter knife!"

The surly voice was unmoved. "I'll transfer you to appointments." Immediately, more hold music began blasting out of the speakers. This time it was Yanni. The aching in Maul's sinuses reached epic proportions, and he began to froth at the mouth. His hands clenched spastically around a Darthaware butter knife for the next forty minutes, until a perky woman's voice came on over the speakers.

"Hi! This is Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO. My name is Boo-Boo, and I'm your personal appointment coordinator. May I get your name?"

"Maul," the aforementioned managed to grate out. "Darth Maul."

"Okay!" chirped Boo-Boo. Click click click, tap tap tap. Click click tap. "We're sorry, we don't seem to have you in our database. Are you by chance known by another name? Or is this your first time visiting Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO?"

"I am Darth Maul. But I haven't been seen by...whatever your name is before."

"Oh, I'm dreadfully sorry. You'll have to come by our office in the Manarai Mountains to set up an account." Boo-Boo was very good at the fake sympathy.

"Look, I'm in dreadful pain. I just want this fixed!"

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm not authorized to make you an appointment unless the advice line nurse says you absolutely have to have one. And then you'll have to pay full price for it, because you're not covered under our insurance."

"FINE," Maul grated.

"Transferring you now! Please hold." With a click, the mellifluous sounds of the 298,365th Nal Hutta Belch-Off emanated from Darth Maul's holoaud unit. That was quickly cut off by another recording. "We're sorry, the Advice Line Nurse is busy with another caller. Thank you for holding. Your call is important to Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO, and we will make every reasonable effort to answer your call in the order in which it was received." The swinging sounds of Hutts burping faded back in, accompanied by commentary.

"Nee chooba ta wankie!" announced one announcer. "Yup," the other agreed, "You said it Fode. He woulda got a nine for that if it weren't for the frog he coughed up."

This went on for some hours.

"Oh, look!" remarked Beed. "It's a little human! Name of 'Shaggy' Snyder. Heh, never heard of a human that could take on Hutts before."

"Ack tootoo meech blurgle."

"You said it! Let's move the microphone in real close, so we don't miss it." Sounds of creaking machinery followed, and were in turn followed by a burp so loud My Apprentice was shaken off her accustomed perch on top of the mess of power cords that led to Maul's stereo. Meowing loudly, she ripped all of the cords out of their sockets, and stalked off to kick shit out of her litterbox.

"Goomba," the announcer began, "bic--"

"Aaaah..." Maul was still shaken by the burp. "Oh, right. I have this pounding pain in my face, and three of my horns are wilting."

"Pain in your face, huh? Horns? You're a Devaronian?"

"Zabrakian, I think."

"Oh, yeah. That would explain it. Sounds like you've got a sinus infection. Yup, you definitely need to be seen. I'm going to transfer you back to appointments. Just tell them that I said you need an appointment." Click. Buzz.

"Thank you for holding. Your call is important to Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO, and we will make every reasonable effort to answer your call in the order in which it was received."

This was, in turn, drowned out by Ewokstock '23872. Maul shuddered and crawled under the bed for the next three hours.

"DARTH MAUL!" he growled menacingly.

"Oh, right, the out-of-network. Did the Advice Line Nurse say you needed an appointment?"

"YES."

"Okiday!" Maul had a sudden sneaking suspicion that he knew what planet this girl had come from. "All right, I've got you a midnight appointment with Dr. Lwkncalkdwoinvcalkdslaksowieuriuaoinclskdnfoaiwheoisldkhklgalskdhwoiazlzowx xvas-OOM! the 2983rd, for the sixteenth."

"What?" Maul protested. "The sixteenth is two weeks away!"

"Oh, not the sixteenth of this month. The sixteenth of next month is the earliest anybody can see you."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"

"Did you want to cancel your appointment?"

"No, no, no, I'll take it."

"All right. You'll be in the Palpatine Wing of the 92nd Equator Hospital."

Maul frowned. "The Palpatine Wing?"

Boo-Boo was more than happy to supply useless information. "Oh yeah, it was named after Senator Palpatine of Naboo, who supplied all the funds necessary to build it. Isn't he a great guy?"

"Yeah, wonderful," Maul gritted out between his rotten teeth.

***

A month and two weeks later, Maul was a quivering mess of swollen sinuses. Purple fluid had started to leak out his now-infected ears, and he stared at a dust Gungan My Apprentice was trying to disembowel with a kind of indifferent fascination.

"Gaaah," he mumbled as Obi-Wan wandered into his apartment.

"Hi neighbor!" chirruped the pesky Padawan. For once, Maul didn't want to take him aside and paddle him till he squealed delightfully.

I must be really sick, moaned the Sith apprentice to himself. He didn't dare say anything aloud. The last time he'd done that--three weeks ago--he hadn't been able to eat for the rest of the week. This infection was truly of the Dark Side...or was it Light? Maul couldn't bear to think, so he simply moaned.

"Awww, is my poor widdle snookums sick? My Da said you needed a ride to the hospital, so here I am." Sidious, looking out for his apprentice's welfare? Maul wondered if he were delirious.

Ten minutes later, he had his answer. Obi-Wan's driving wasn't honing Maul's hatred as much as making the appointment had honed it, but the Jedi was getting pretty close. Maul attempted to use the Mind Whammy on Obi-Wan to get him to stop taking hair-pin turns at twice the speed limit, but since he couldn't speak, it didn't work. Normally he would have relished his lover's most un-Jedi-like flaunting of law and order, but at the moment, the fluid sloshing around inside Maul's face stretched his inflamed sinuses in exciting new directions with each turn and drop.

Finally, after an ordeal more trying than the time Maul had had to videotape his Master's soft-core porn debut, they arrived. Obi-Wan helpfully tossed Maul out of the back seat onto the pavement and sped off to The Grey Side of the Force. Maul let the surge of jealousy overwhelm his mind; it made staggering into the office less painful. "I'b god a midight abboidbed," he mumbled to the receptionist, who scowled up at the Sith from where he, she, or it was filing his, her, or its impressive claws. "Go sit over there. The doctor will be with you shortly." The being returned to its claws, ignoring Maul completely.

The rage flowed through him, and Maul reached for his lightstaff, only to lose his balance completely as his inner ear decided to join his sinuses in the land of happy fun bacteria. He meekly inched over to the waiting area for the Ear, Nose, and Throat Clinic, flopping beside the only other patient, a human girl with hair that looked bleached and a constant sniffle straight from the seventh level of Sith Hell, the Constant-Small-Noises-At-Irregular-Intervals circle. Maul took the only seat, next to her, and tried to look interested in a millennia-old Reader's Digest. "Corellia's First Senators to the Republic" looked boring, and so did "The Wilds of Coruscant". Ah, here was an article bemoaning the fledgling Order of Jedi Knights. Maul smirked as he flipped pages.

"Hey. You." The girl hawked a big glob of mucus back into her throat, then resumed sniffling. Maul shuddered and turned to look at her.

"What, pitiful human?"

"You are so rude!" the girl exclaimed, sneezing all over the Sith Lord. "You sat down and didn't even ask my permission."

Maul sighed. "Look, kid, this is the only seat available. Now why don't you get a tissue and leave me to die here in peace?"

"You'd better watch out. I'm having a very bad day."

Maul frowned, and considered. Yes, now that he thought about it, the girl did have a very strong presence in the Dark Side. "Good," he hissed, "Use your anger. Your hate will make you powerful!"

The girl stared back at him. "Freak!" she shrieked, "You're an abomination! Get--away--! Go away!" Her beer belly jiggled inside her tube top revoltingly as she slapped Maul on the cheek. Moaning, he doubled over, then sat straight up again as his sinuses flooded. He groaned and pondered faking sudden catastrophic heart attack to get away from this harpy.

She shrieked again. "You lay a hand on me, you horny tattooed cult freak, and I'll make sure you never walk upright again! And just for leering at me like I'm some kind of prostitute, I'm going to make sure that you don't get in the doctor's office until morning! Hah! So take that!"

Luckily, he was saved when a blue Twi'lek nurse appeared. "Mercy!" she called.

Maul wished he could call for deliverance from this tormentor. But amazingly, the girl jumped up and pranced over to the nurse, batting her eyelashes cutely. "Oh, is Doctor Snu going to fix my sinuses this time? Doctor Blorp didn't, and Doctor Lwkncalkdwoinvcalkdslaksowieuriuaoinclskdnfoaiwheoisldkhklgalskdhwoiazlzowx xvas-OOM! the 2983rd was completely useless..."

***

The girl was true to her word, and Coruscant's sun was inching over the horizon by the time the Twi'lek returned. "Um, Darth? Maul?"

Maul put down his years-old issue of Pod and Racer and managed to stand up, wobbling over to the Twi'lek. "What an interesting name," she blathered. "Is it Malastarian?" Maul's answering growl seemed to satisfy her, and she led him to a small room, handing him a small square of paper. "Now strip and put on this robe," she ordered.

"Look. Miz. Laalaa. My. Face. Hurts. I. Do. Not. Need. To. Strip."

"Of course you do, dearie," the nurse retorted. Maul remembered that the Mind Whammy tended not to work on those with nothing to Whammy. "Now I'll be right back with Dr. Lwkncalkdwoinvcalkdslaksowieuriuaoinclskdnfoaiwheoisldkhklgalskdhwoiazlzowx xvas-OOM! the 2983rd, okay?"

***

Fifteen hours later, the doctor waddled in, pressed a stethoscope to Maul's face, and said in a bubbly voice, "Young lady, have you been breathing oxygen again?"

"I--"

"Don't tell me you haven't, I can see it in your face. Here." The doctor handed Maul a pamphlet titled _Kick the Oxygen Habit: 12 Steps to Cleaner Methane_. "Now tell me, do you feel nauseated?"

"Only when I see holograms of my master's family and realize how many of them I've screwed."

"Good, good, that's a perfectly natural response. Well, I could put you under the MucuSuction, but I think instead you should just take these antibiotics." The doctor grasped a stack of prescriptions in one pincher and tossed them at Maul, who peered through them.

"One of these, three of these, seven of these?!? Four of these unless the blue one gets caught in my throat? How big ARE these?!" Maul began to panic.

"Oh, not that big," bubbled the doctor absently. "A few centimeters, nothing bigger."

"WHAT?!?"

"Young lady, I know what I'm doing. These are the latest drugs and they've been proven to work on everyone of your race! Now, the green ones and the purple striped ones, when taken in combination, may produce sexual dysfunction in Hutts, so if you're one you should watch out."

"Just give me the prescriptions," Maul growled. He didn't want to think about Hutts having sexual dysfunctions, or functions for that matter.

***

Midway through Darth Maul's second hour waiting in the check-out line, Obi-Wan Kenobi came sashaying through, then squealed with delight when he saw his odd-looking neighbor. He snagged the Sith Lord in a kamikaze hug, gleefully smooching the tip of one of his horns. "Maulie! You look so much better already!" he squealed.

"Aaah," Maul replied intelligently, hands sliding under Kenobi's robe as he did so.

"Eek!" squealed the Padawan. "Wait till we're home!"

"Fine, fine," agreed Maul, carefully palming Obi-Wan's wallet. "I'll wait."

***

"That'll be 2937501.92 credits," the receptionist said nasally. "Make your check out to Coruscant Republic Hospitals, Incorporated, a division of Jedi Health Care, Unlimited, a subsidiary of Galactic Health Care and Tire Service, itself under the jurisdiction of Freezle-bat-ugggh, Your Friendly HMO."

"Do you take American Express?" Darth Maul inquired pleasantly. It was amazing how a little petty larceny brightened one's day.

"Of course."

***

A month and a half later, Darth Maul was lounging on his couch, boredly playing You Don't Know Sith. The months of pain, the enormous pills, the endless waiting, and most of all, the hippie pansy Jedi yogurt he'd had to take with his antibiotic cocktail; all that was about to be vindicated.

Obi-Wan Kenobi was due to get his American Express statement today.

Maul looked at his chronometer, heard Obi-Wan's footsteps going out into the hall, stopping at his mail tray, returning to his apartment. The riffling of the pages of Playgirl. The tossing of three pieces of junk mail. Finally, the opening of the envelope...the unfolding of the bill...and the sound that Maul had waited to hear.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!"

The End (at last!)

(8/1/99)

Email the author

To the Chronological Story Index
To the Author Story Index

Return to the Sith Academy Homepage
Back to Siubhan's House of Horror