Escape from the Spire

"Lord Maul&mdash;we're going to get you out of here."

- Gar Saxon

During the Death Watch takeover of the planet Mandalore, Darth Maul was captured by his former Sith Master, Darth Sidious. The Dark Lord of the Sith imprisoned his former apprentice, the leader of Death Watch, in The Spire, a prison operated by the Confederacy of Independent Systems on Stygeon Prime. Sidious' vessel was followed by Rook Kast and Gar Saxon of Death Watch, with orders from Almec, Prime Minister of Mandalore, to help Maul escape from The Spire.

Following Maul's interrogation by the Sith Lord and Separatist leader, Count Dooku, Kast and Saxon assaulted the prison and rescued their captive leader. Once off of Stygeon Prime, Maul and his two followers rendezvoused with the remainder of their forces on Zanbar, where the Separatists launched a battle intended to weaken Maul enough so he would seek out Mother Talzin&mdash;giving the Sith an opportunity to destroy her.

Prelude
"I'm not going to kill you. I have other uses for you."

- Darth Sidious, to Darth Maul

During the Clone Wars, Darth Maul returned to galactic prominence after previously having been assumed dead during the Battle of Naboo over a decade earlier. Maul assembled an army called the Shadow Collective, comprised of members of the criminal underworld, including Death Watch, Black Sun, the Pyke Syndicate, and the Hutt Clan. Together, these criminal forces took over Mandalore, fulfilling a years-long goal for Death Watch, which sought to restore Mandalore's warrior past from its pacifist government.

During a battle in Sundari, Mandalore's capital city, Darth Maul and his brother, Savage Opress, were confronted by Maul's former Sith Master, Darth Sidious. The Dark Lord of the Sith saw Maul as a rival and sought to eliminate the threat to his rule over the Sith. In a duel in Sundari, Sidious killed Opress and took Maul prisoner, claiming he still had use for his former apprentice; it was Sidious' hope that Maul would lead the Sith to Mother Talzin, Maul's mother and the leader of the Nightsisters, so she too could be destroyed.

Sidious brought Maul to The Spire, a prison fortress controlled by the Confederacy of Independent Systems on Stygeon Prime. It was there that Sidious briefly interrogated Maul, and told Count Dooku, Sidious' apprentice, to find out information about who and where the Shadow Collective leaders were. The goal was to make Maul believe that the Sith wanted to destroy the Shadow Collective, so he would seek out Mother Talzin. Meanwhile, Sidious was followed to Stygeon Prime by two Death Watch warriors, Rook Kast and Gar Saxon, under orders from Mandalore's Prime Minister, Almec, to free Maul from The Spire.

The escape
Once inside The Spire, and while Dooku interrogated Maul for information about the Shadow Collective, Kast and Saxon contacted Almec, with Saxon telling the Prime Minister that they had located Maul on the seventh level of the prison. Almec gave them the order to proceed, and the two set off explosive charges on the third level of the prison as a diversion. Battle droids were sent to the third level to investigate the explosion, though Dooku suspected that the true target of the attack was Darth Maul. Droidekas were sent to the seventh level, where the two Mandalorians disabled super battle droids with electromagnetic explosives.

As they approached Maul's cell, Kast and Saxon took out the droidekas with a rocket, destroying them and clearing the approach to the cell. Once they had Maul, they freed him from his restraints and informed him that they had arrived to rescue him. They shot another rocket through the walls of the prison, and all three escapees repelled via zipline out of the fortress and through the mountains to the surface, where a group of battle droids opted against pursuing them. With little resistance, designed to deliberately allow Maul to escape, the three boarded a Death Watch Gauntlet fighter and lifted off. Before leaving Stygeon Prime, the fighter fired back into the prison, destroying the battle droids who had decided against chasing them.

Aftermath
"The war you have waited your entire lives to fight is upon us, my brothers. Victory or death!"

- Darth Maul to his Death Watch forces

Kast and Saxon took Maul to Zanbar as ordered, where the Death Watch leader reunited with his forces. They were followed by the Separatists, led by General Grievous&mdash;who was under strict orders to weaken, but not destroy Maul, which would force him to seek out Mother Talzin for help against the Sith. The two armies collided on Zanbar and, by the battle's end, Maul ordered his forces to retreat. As Sidious and Dooku suspected, Maul contacted Mother Talzin, who told him to meet the Separatists in combat again on Ord Mantell. During the next battle, Maul captured Dooku and Grievous, leading to a temporary alliance between Maul and Dooku when confronted by the Grand Army of the Republic.

Behind the scenes
Darth Maul's escape from The Spire appeared in the comic book Star Wars: Darth Maul&mdash;Son of Dathomir 1, written by Jeremy Barlow and published by Dark Horse Comics on May 21, 2014. At the time, the prison did not have a name, but was later named "The Spire" in Star Wars Rebels: The Visual Guide.

Appearances

 * Star Wars: Darth Maul—Son of Dathomir 1
 * Star Wars: Darth Maul&mdash;Son of Dathomir 2